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HEABLETS LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTERS 



FROM ITALY 



BY 



j^^t^Iheadley, 



NEW AND REVISED EDITION. 




NEW YORK: 
CHARLES SCRIBNER, 

36 PARK ROW AND 145 NASSAU STREET. 
1853. 



E>TERED, according to Act of Coigreflfl, in the year 181?, by 

BAKER & 5CRIBXER, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United Srates for the 
Southern District of Xew York. 



^^ TKOMAS B. SMITH, STEREOTYPER, S W. BKVKDICT, PRINTKR, 

'^ 216 WILLIAM STREET, N. Y. 1»> SPRm STRKXT. 



<) 



INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. 



Since the publication of tlie following letters, many things 
have occurred to give a prominence to Italian politics which 
they did not before possess, as well as tend to change one's 
views respecting the Italian people. On reflection, however, I 
have concluded to let my opinions stand uncorrected in the body 
of the work, so that my original design maybe carried out — viz., 
to give my impressions at the time, or, in other words, to talk 
as I travelled, leaving the reader to draw his own conclusions. 
I was then some years younger than now, and hence uttered 
many sentiments I should now suppress. The rainbow hues and 
romance of life depart as we grow older, and common places 
take the place of sentiment ; still the frankness and freedom 
with which these letters were written have their merits as well as 
defects : at all events, first impressions are fresher, if not more 
correct than afterthoughts, and therefore I shall let them remain. 

With regard to the political state of Italy, however, I would 
say something additional. 

Those acquainted with history are aware of the iniquitous par- 
tition made of Italy, after the downfall of Napoleon. The allied 
sovereigns, assembled in Vienna, regarded it as so much com- 
mon plunder. Venice and Milan were given to Austria ; Mo- 
dena sliced off for an Austrian prince, who had usurped the name 
of Este ; while the wife of Napoleon, as the daughter of Aus- 
tria, had Parma. A Bourbon had a life interest in Modena ; 
Genoa was treacherously given over by England into the hands 
of Piedmont, and Tuscany put under an Austrian Duke. The 
Pope was allowed to retain possession of about 18,117 Ro- 



VI INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. 

man square miles, containing a population of 2,500,000, over 
which he ruled as absolute king. So heavy have been his op- 
pressions, that his kingdom at length became reduced to 
bankruptcy. The revenue amounted to only $10,000,000, one 
quarter of which was expended in mere collection. The public 
debt increased so fast, that constant loans were necessary, until 
at length the government securities were all used up, and the 
Pontiff was compelled to mortgage his palaces at Rome. The 
legates and delegates ruling the several provinces became noto- 
riously dishonest and corrupt ; even magisti-ates could be bought, 
while men were imprisoned, ad infinitum, on mere suspicion. 
Six thousand were computed to be incarcerated every year, or 
one out of every four hundred of the population. 

Now, when we add to all these the rigorous censorship of the 
press, the espionage of the police, and the relentless persecution 
of men for their political opinions, to say nothing of the oppres- 
sive taxes and discouragement of all industry, we cannot be sur- 
prised at the bitter feelings manifested by the people towards the 
Pope. The stream of all their troubles was traced directly to 
the pontifical throne. At the feet of the holy father sank all 
their hopes and happiness. A corrupt sovereign, corrupt priest- 
hood, corrupt courts, corrupt officials — half of them pardoned 
banditti — everywhere made a mockery of justice, religion, and 
human suffering. The strong hand of power crushed the life 
out of Italy, and hence arose the endless conspii'acies which have 
resulted only in filling Austrian prisons with victims, and ships 
with exiles. 

Now it is evident, from this meagre outline, that such a state 
of things could not long exist. There is a limit to all oppres- 
sion, a point where desperation begins and revolutions follow. 
Pope Gregory was a tool of Austria ; and too stupid to perceive, 
or too timid to prevent, the bankruptcy and fast aJJproaching 
ruin of his kingdom, let oppression take its course. But tho 



INTRODUOTION TO THE NEW EDITION. vii 

present Pontiff, on coming into power, had the sense to discover 
his true position, and took the only course by -which to aUay the 
smothered fires' of rebellion, that were burning portentously 
under his throne. He knew the state of the public feeling — that 
everything was rife for an outbreak ; and had Cardinal Lambrus- 
chini, the old Pope's chief minister, been elected in his placC; 
there doubtless would have been a convulsion that would have 
overturned the Papal throne, or ended in a general massacre of 
the people. But Pope Pius took his seat, and a calm — the calm 
of expectation and of anxiety — followed. He was surrounded 
with difficulties — a bankrupt and impoverished kingdom, a suf- 
fering and maddened people on the one side, and the power of 
Austria on the other. To act for the people would bring down 
on him the armies of Austria — to act for Austria, the wrath of 
the people. A few days after his election, he abolished the se- 
cret tribunal for political offenders ; he next composed a council 
of cardinals, to hear, on a certain day, the grievances of any one 
who chose to come ; and finally ordered a private letter-box to 
be affixed to the Vatican, in which all could drop their com- 
plaints and petitions. Still the people scarcely knew what to 
believe : these might all be simply strokes of policy, to allay 
popular indignation. He next dismissed Cardinal Lambruschi- 
ni, but this only awakened deeper anxiety ; until at length his 
course seemed to be clearly pronounced, when he granted a gene- 
ral amnesty to all political offenders. Rome stood thunder- 
struck at this bold movement. The prisons, with their six thou- 
sand annually incarcerated victims, threw open their doors, and 
exiles came joyfully back to their native land. 

Now in all this it would be unfair to say that the Pope was 
actuated alone by motives of policy. He is, doubtless, a more 
liberal and a better man than his predecessor. He himself had 
a brother in exile ; and as a missionary, formerly to Chili, and 
afterwards to Buenos Ayres, he has learned, like Louis Philippe, 



v!L' INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. 

to regard the rights of the people, and respect their feelings and 
their wants. 

Still policT has had much to do with the course he has taken. 
His travels in the new world opened his eyes to truths that it 
became him to recognise ; and he saw plainly that the Pontiff 
of 1847 could not be the despot that a former age tolerated. 

Bat he had no intention of weakening, in any way, the power 
of the papal government, or of enlarging the civil liberty of the 
people. What he has done, in this respect, towards giving a 
constitutional government, has been compelled from him by the 
movement in Europe. The grand excitement occasioned by 
his reform, and the extravagant hopes expressed, were altogether 
too premature. So long as Austria and the other continental 
powers stood firm, there was no hope of constitutional liberty in 
Italy — and even now it is to be very much feared that the endless 
rivabies and jealousies that exist between the several provinces 
will defeat any movement towards a grand confederacy of the 
states. 

The most powerful prince of the peninsula, is Carlo Alberto 
(Charles Albert), King of Sardinia. He has a large and well- 
disciplined army under his control, and has abeady entered the 
field against Austria. 

But perhaps I could not give my views better, and at the 
same time claim for them some weight, by showing that time has 
proved their correctness, than by quoting an extract from a 
published address of mine on the subject delivered the early 
part of last winter. 

" But who is this Carlo Alberto — King Charles Albert — who 
has thi-eatened to meet Austria in the field, if she attempts to 
occupy Ferrara, and has off3red his services to Pope Pius IX. ? 
The veriest de?pot and traitor that ever escaped the punish- 
ment due his crimes. He himself was once at the head of one 



INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. ix 

of the most formidable conspiracies ever set on foot for the re- 
demption of Italy. Chief of the Carbonari, he promised con- 
stitutional freedom to the country. That conspiracy counted 
some of the noblest spirits of the age. But just on the eye of its 
development, death removed the obstructions between Charles 
Albert and the throne of Piedmont ; aed vaulting into it, he 
immediately seized the conspirators he himself had seduced into 
his ambitious plans ; and, by imprisonment, banishment, and 
death, rid himself of his old friends, and became the most hated 
tyrant in Europe. Added to all this, he is a Jesuit of the Jesuits, 
and as weak as he is villanous. He upholds the Pope, offers his 
aid, and talks loudly of the independence and nationality of Italy ! 
Ah! ' Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes.'' I fear such a man, 
luhen he brings, and though he brings, gifts in his hands. But, 
it may be asked, what motive has he for the course he adopts .'' 
Three very powerful ones. In the first place, he was hated in- 
tensely by his own subjects ; and he knew it, and feared their 
anger. This dislike he could remove in no way so effectually as 
by upholding the Pope ; and already has he found his reward. 
In the second place, Austria is the only power he has to fear ; 
she trenches on his borders, and holds him in perpetual alarm ; 
and he will willingly seize any event that would injure his 
enemy, and compel him to evacuate Italy. In the third place, 
in case of any successful hostilities, he could not but enlarge his 
territory. If, through his instrumentality, Austria should be 
spoiled of her possessions in Italy, he knows he could dictate his 
own terms to the Pope ; and rest assured he would be content 
with nothing less than half of the peninsula. He is the most 
powerful sovereign in it, and he looks with a covetous eye on 
those fair portions of Lombardy which the Austrians hold. 

But as for wishing the liberty of Italy, or caring anything 
about its independence and nationality, except so far as that 
nationality consists in being under one despotic sovereign, and 



X INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. 

lie that sovereign, he is innocent. Will a man that has been 
guilty of the darkest critaos that stain our nature, in order to 
get a throne, advance measures to overturn it r" 

Events have since shown this statement to be true ; for after 
having " fraternized" with the popular movement, and marched 
against Austria, he now openly declares that he u-ill not allow a 
republic to be established in the north of Italy. He has not left 
the cold hills of Piedmont, and led his armies into the smiling 
plains of Lombardy, to make them free, but a part of his king- 
dom. Not by him, but over him, will the northern Italians be 
compelled to win their freedom. He will prove himself as hard 
a master as Austria, if once allowed to gain the ascendency. 

In the address from which the above is quoted, I stated also 
that there was nothing in the popular movement in Italy, which, 
of itself, promised success — that, if she ever gained her liberty, 
it must be afler the overthrow of the strong monarchies of the 
continent, not by rising against them, for she was too weak to 
do this. ]Sro one could, then, have anticipated so sudden an 
outbreak as has since followed. But what I said at that time is 
equally true now. After speaking of the difficulties in the way 
of a free constitutional government, I said : — 

" But is tyranny always to exist .- Ino ; it will yet come to an 
end in Italy, but only as it comes to an end in Europe. Then 
it will be the result, rather than a cause — the product of con- 
vulsions and revolutions in more powerfid States. If there be 
one thing fixed in destiny, it is the steady, resistless progress 
of the republican principle. Struggle as despots may — sur- 
round themselves as they will with all the checks and restraints 
on popular feeling — bind and torture, and exile and slay, the 
terrible day of reckoning is slowly advancing. Before this gin- 
gle principle Europe is incessantly pushed forward to the brink 



INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. xi 

of a frightful gulf. On that brink despotism will make its last 
stand and final struggle. The statesmen of Europe see it and 
know it, and hope only to defer the day of evil. Come, thoy 
know it will. As Guizot lately said in the Chamber of Deputies, 
All Germany is on fire, I might, if I had time, prove this, to 
the full conviction of every mind ; but I will only point to 
Europe now and Europe sixty years ago, as fearful corrobora- 
tion of what I say. Europe is yet to be set afloat on the 
turbulent sea of democracy. The French Revolution is but 
one act in the great tragedy yet to be enacted. That, with 
Bonaparte at its head, whelmed the continent in blood, and 
made the knees of every monarch smite together, like Belshaz- 
zar's of old. The next shall open under their very thrones , as the 
French Revolution did under the throne of the Bourbons. The 
people are yet to have the power, and woe then to those who 
have maddened them. It needs not the ear of prophecy, it re- 
quires only the ear of reason, to hear the sound of falling 
thrones in the future. Fugitive kings are to flit through the 
realms they have ruined. Now, barrier after barrier is erected, 
check after check applied, promise after promise made and 
broken, to arrest the waves of popular feeling ; yet they keep 
swelling higher and higher. Soon the last barrier shall be 
raised, the last check exhausted, and then the increasing flood 
will burst over. What is to come of it, I cannot tell. Through 
the blackness of that approaching storm no eye but God's can 
pierce. Whether anarchy or constitutional liberty is to spring 
out of it, He only knows ; but the experiment of self-govern- 
ment the people of Europe are yet to try. No power can 
prevent it. Around the ruins of Italy, and the feudal castles 
of England and Germany, amid the forests of Russia, the 
struggle of the people with their rulers is to take place. 
Every man who will sit down to the study of history with this 



xii INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION. 

single question before Liim, will turn pale at the conclusions he 
cannot escape." 

When this was uttered I had no idea it would so soon prove 
true. The immediate results in Italy and Europe no man can 
foretell ; but that there will be a reaction against the panic 
that has paralyzed monarchs, I have but little doubt. This 
will probably be followed by a struggle and a long war. That 
Italy may gain from the conflict and collision at hand, is my 
most ardent wish. The spirit the Italian people have shown 
thus far, proves that many of my views respecting them were 
incorrect ; that they possess far more greatness and stability 
of character than travellers have given them credit for. I 
rejoice that it is so, and hope that the Italian Republics of a 
former age may be more than renewed in the present century. 
At all events, the people have shown themselves worthy of a 
noble destiny. 



PREFACE. 



Ihe accompanying Letters were not originally written with 
the intention of being published in a book, and, very probably, 
would have been worse written if they had been. In passing 
through Italy, one is constantly subjected to sudden and great 
transitions of feeling. The " classic land" and the " home of 
the Cassars," have so long been a portion of the scholar's dreams, 
and so brightly colored with his own feelings, that the very mat- 
ter-of-fact objects that stare him in the face, when he is expect- 
ing some hallowed monument of the past, will often quite upset 
his gravity, and compel him to laugh, where he thought to have 
been serious and reflective. It has been my effort, in these Let- 
ters, to give a faithful transcript of my feelings, in all these sudden 
transitions. To some there may often appear too much light- 
ness and frivolity ; yet most men like to have one give himself 
in his travels ; they wish to hear him soliloquizing. We read his 
book not to learn that he can be, or is, a very serious and pro- 
found man, but to know how things struck him — that is, travel 
with him. Amid the new and exciting scenes that constantly 
meet travellers, in perhaps a hurried passage over a country, 
they cannot, and do not, have the views and feelings so often 
given, for appearance'' s sake, as their honest ones. 



PREFACE. 



My purpose has been to let others, if possible, look through 
my eyes ; and whether I have succeeded or not, or whether 
they would have obtained a very interesting view if they did, I 
leave the reader to judge. Descriptions of galleries of art, 
paintings, etc., have been avoided, as possessing interest to those 
only who have travelled over the same ground, and become fa- 
miliar with the details necessary to make those descriptions clear. 
I have attempted, also, to give some idea of the condition of the 
inhabitants, especially of the lower classes, as they are topics 
seldom referred to in passing over the most classic land on the 
globe. 

It was designed at first to publish these Letters in numbers, 
and the fii'st number was issued, but the plan was immediately 
abandoned, and the publication of the remainder deferred till 
the whole could be issued in a volume. The first number em- 
braced only Genoa and a portion of Naples — the least interest- 
ing part of Italy. Rome, Florence, Milan, the provinces, etc., 
are included in the remainder. 



CONTENTS. 



Let 



I 
II. 

III. 

IV. 
V. 

VI. 

VII. 
VIII. 



IX. 

X. 

XI. 

XII. 

XIII. 

XIV. 

XV. 

XVI. 

XVII. 

XVIII. 

XIX. 

XX. 

XXI. 

XXII. 

XXIII. 
XXIV. 
XXV 



Voyage to Italy — Man Lost Overboard 

Gibraltar — Approach to Genoa . « . 

First Impressions — Lunatics . . . . 

Description of Genoa 

House -Hunting — Romantic Marriage * 

Funeral in the Morning — Murder of an American 
Officer . . . . . • . 

Carnival — Clara Novello — Persecution of a Painter 

Columbus' Manuscripts — Horseback Ride — Death in 
THE Theatre . . 

A Day's Ramble through Genoa .... 

Italian Soirees and Beauty — Marquis of Palavicini 

Odd Brokers — A Catholic Miracle 

Lord Byron — Marquis di Negro . . . . 

Soldiers at Mass — Casino — Italian Virtue . • 

Scenes of the Carnival — Cheating the Church . 

Leghorn — Civita Vecchia — Naples .... 

Pompeii . . . 

Ascent of Vesuvius 

Ladies of Italy and Ladies of America 

Islands about Naples — Virgil's Scenes 

A Visit to Salerno — P^estum 

Castellamare — A Storm at Naples .... 

Capua — A Begging Friar — Cenotaph of Cicero — Peas- 
ant Girl ........ 

Approach to Rome — St. Peter's 

Saturday before Easter — Easter Sunday 

Illumination of St. Peter's — The Girandola 



Pagb 
. 1 

8 

. 11 

16 

. 19 

24 
. 29 

32 
. 36 

42 
. 47 

51 
. 57 

62 
. 65 

70 
. 77 

85 
. 91 

96 
103 

107 
112 
115 
129 



CONTENTS. 



Let. XXVI. 

XXVII. 

XXVIII. 

XXIX. 

XXX. 

XXXI. 

XXXII. 

XXXIII. 

XXXIV. 

XXXV. 



XXXVI. 

XXXVII. 

XXXVIII. 

XXXIX. 

XL. 

XLI. 

XLII. 
XLIII. 



XLIV. 

XLV. 

XLVI. 



Pxou 

Chanting of the IMiserere in the Sistlne Chapel 130 
System of Farmlng in the Papai. States . . .135 

The Coliseum at Midnight 139 

Ruins and Epitaphs 144 

Capitol and Vatican 149 

The Pope — Don IMiguel — Mezzofakti .... 151 
New INIode of Selling Milk — Lake Tartarus — 

Adrian's Villa — Tivoli . . . . 154 

An Improvisatrice — Ascent of St. Peter's . . . IGO 

Artists' Fete . 1G4 

Villa Pamph^'lia — Vespers — Borgiieslvn Villa — The 

QUIRINAL TaSSO's OaK r\\REWELL TO St. Pe- 

ter's 170 

Departure from Rome — Peppery Englishsian . . 177 

Fall of Terni 182 

Perugia — Clitumnus — Battle-Field of Thrasymene 186 

A Max Built ev a Wall 191 

American Artists in Florence . . . . 19G 

Venus di Medici — Titlyn's Venuses — Death of a 

Child — An English Family .... 203 
•Stroll through Florence — Dominican Friar . . 207 
Pisa — Condition of Italian Peasantry — Con-^'ersation 

WITH a Peasant Girl 218 

King of Sardinia — Censorship of the Press — A 

Smuggling Priest 215 

Alless.sndria — Battle-Field of ]M\reng3 — 1*avia — 

MiL.\N . . 218 

Character of the People of I paly . . , 222 



LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER I. 

A Voyage to Italy — Sea-Sickness — Squalls — A Man Lost Overboard— Peril 
of the Crew. 

At Sea, Sept. 15, 1842. 

Dear E. — Why not begin my letter at sea ? It is now no 
more travel-worn than Arabia Petraja. I hate this skipping over 
the ocean as " not worth mentioning" to burst on the reader from 
the middle of some Continent. 

It was a beautiful day when we left New York, but it did seem 
cruel that you were not there to bid me good-bye. The laughter 
and mirth amid which my fancy painted you, your wife, and 

cousin A at Saratoga, seemed a mockery of my grief, as I 

floated away from the shore on which my heart lay, and refused 
to come to me. But when the pilot-boat left us, and the last 
thread of communication was cut off between me and the land 
that never seemed so dear before, I thought perhaps after all it 
was better to part so. It was easier to fling you an adieu up the 
Hudson, than to squeeze your hand over the vessel's side, when 
the tongue could not utter the farewell the heart spoke so loudly 
the while. 

Our vessel was a beautiful Mobile Packet, and Mr. L., consul 
to Genoa, his wife, two children, myself, and a servant, constituted 
one family, and the entire corps of passengers, with the exception 

of Mr. S , of New York, who, like myself, was in search of 

2 



LETTERS FRO 31 ITALY. 



health. We sat grouped on deck, tnmg to laugh and appear in- 
different, but it would not do. It was like boys whisthng in thft 
dark to keep off danger. But the overwhelming grief I expected 
to feel as I saw the last blue hill of my father-land sink into the 
western sky, never came. Nothing ever seemed to me more 
poetic or pathetic than Byron's farewell to the la.nd of his birth ; 

" Adieu, adieu — my native land 
Fades o'er the waters blue," «&c. 

And as 1 saw the dim shores die away in the distance, I expected 
ifhe thousand fond recollections of home and its quiet joys, per- 
laps to be mine no more for ever — ^the deep yearning of heart 
oward the land I had trod from my 'infancy, and now left an in- 
valid, together with the uncertainty and solitude of the sea, 
would quite unman me. But nothing could be farther from the 
truth. The sadness I had felt when drifting down the bay wa^ 
fast disappearing, and the slow, hea\y rolling of the vessel, soon 
after we were fairly at sea, brought on that strange sensation in 
one's head and stomach which entirely upsets his poetry — and by 
the time Never-sink began to sink beyond the waters, I cared for 
neither home nor country. Yet as the setting sun left his fare- 
well on the waters, and the blue sky seemed to bend so lovingly 
over the land I loved, I thought it was quite too Pagan to feel na 
sadness. So I began to repeat to myself those sweet lines of 
Byron, but I made more rhymes than the illustrious poet himself. 
If uttered aloud they would have run ; 

" Adieu, adieu — my native land (ugi. ugh,) 
Fades o'er the waters blue." (ugh.) 

I could get no farther, and even when the broad round moon 
rode up the gorgeous night-heavens, making the sea a floor of sil- 
ver, the effort vras no more successful. Not the sweet moon and 
•jvveeter stars, nor the broad heaving sea, nor fading Neversink it- 
self could whip up any sentiment. I fully agreed with Plato for 
the time that the soul was located in the stomach — at least they 
sympathized like tw^o brothers. For a whole week we were & 
most dolorous group. The ladies below sat around the cabin pale 
and languid — the two gentlemen above lay rolled up like cater 
pillars to die. Sometimes stretched out in the jolly boat, some- 



SEA-VOYAGING. 



times on the rail, I would watch by the hour the passing clouds 
to escape the dizziness created by the rolling of the ship. 

" A life on the ocean wave" is a pleasant thing to sing about, 
especially if you are in a snug warm room and have Russell to 
sing, but those who tr}' it find the chorus has never yet been 
written. 

The sleeping, or rather not sleeping, in a miserable berth six 
feet by two, holding on to the one above you to prevent being 
thrown out- — the eating like an Eastern devotee bowing over his 
sacrifice — the pitching and tossing of the ship against a head- 
wind on the heavy breakers — the long, monotonous days, and 
often restless nights — the wearisome calms and fearful storms, 
and more than all the yearning after the green quiet earth, make 
a sea- voyage irksome and sickening. It is true there is some re- 
lief to this. There is a beauty at times in the ocean, in its 
changes and mprices, that break its otherwise insufferable 
tedium. I thmk I have never enjoyed mere life more keenly, 
than when sitting in a clear day far out on the flying jib-boom, I 
have careered with the careering vessel, and looking back a-down 
the keel, watched the waters part and foam away from the cleav- 
ing bows. Next to this I love, when the sea is " gently rough," 
to sit on the topmost yard, and look abroad on the great solemn 
ocean, and catching the dim outlines of the vessels that are hover- 
ing on the edge of the horizon, send down " Sail ho !" to the 
dreaming group on deck. It is pleasant also to lean over the 
taffrail and watch the rainbow-dolphin slowly swimming after the 
vessel, or the porpoises floundering ahead, while perhaps the 
black fin of a shark is combing the water in the distance. A clear 
evening on the quarter deck is sweet, when the moist south wind 
just fills the sails that are gently swelling in the light of the moon, 
and the bright sparkles here and there on the water seem the 
twinkling of the feet of Fairies abroad on their nightly revels. 
There is a sense of freedom too at sea. The jostling multitude — 
the jar of wheels, and the clamors of money-mad men, are not 
around. The heart is not compelled to retire within itself lest its 
feelings should be detected, and its emotions mocked. There are 
also time and room enough to think. Everything seems at lei- 
sure — even the waves when most excited have a stately motion. 



LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



But these pleasures are all transient, and then comes the long 
pining after the fresh earth. 

The pleeisure of our passage was much marred by the loss of 
a man overboard. When within a few hundred miles of the 
Azores, we were overtaken by a succession of severe squalls. 
Forming almost instantaneously on the horizon, they moved dowo 
like phantoms on the ship. For a few moments after one struck 
us, we would be buried in foam and spray, and then heavily roll 
ing on a hea\-y sea. We however prepared ourselves, and soon 
got ever}-thing snug. The light sails were all in — the jibs, top- 
gallants and spanker furled close — the main-sail clewed up, and 
we were crashing along under close reefed topsails alone, when a 
man, who was coming down from the last reef, slipped as he 
stepped on the bulwarks, and went over backwards into the waves. 
In a moment that most terrific of all cries at sea, "A man over- 
board ! a man overboard V^ flew like lightning over the ship. I 
sprung upon the quarter deck just as the poor fellow with his 
*• fearful human face," riding the top of a billow, fled past. In 
an instant all was commotion : plank after plank was cast over 
for him to seize and sustain himself on, till the ship (;ould be put 
about and the boat lowered. The first mate, a bold, fiery- fellow, 
leaped into the boat that hung at the side of the quarter deck, 
and in a voice so sharp and stem I seem to hear it yet, shouted, 
'• in men — in men !" But the poor sailors hung back — the sea 
was too wild. The second mate sprung to the side of the first, 
and the men, ashamed to leave both their officers alone, followed. 
" Cut away the lashings," exclaimed the officer — ^the knife glanced 
around the ropes — the boat fell to the water — rose on a huge wave 
far over the deck, and drifted rapidly astern. I thought it could 
Qot live a moment in such a sea, but the officer who held the helm 
was a skillful seamen. Twice in his life he had been wrecked, 
and for a moment I forgot the danger in admiration of his cool 
self-possession. He stood erect — the helm in his hand — his flash- 
ing eve embracing the whole peril in a single glance, and his 
hand bringing the head of the gallant little boat on each high sea 
that otherwise would have swamped her. I watched them tili 
nearly two miles astern, when they lay-to to look for the los« 
sailor. Just then I turned my eve to the Southern horizon anc* 



MAN O^ ERBOARD— A SQUALL. 



saw a squall blacker and heavier than any we had before en- 
countered rushing down upon us. The Captain also saw it, and 
was terribly excited. He afterwards told me that in all his sea 
life he never was more so. He called for a flag, and, springing 
into the shrouds, waved it for their return. The gallant fellowa 
obeyed the signal and pulled for the ship. But it was slow work, 
for the head of the boat had to be laid on to almost every wave. It 
was now growing dark, and if the squall should strike the boat be- 
fore it reached the vessel, there was no hope for it. It would either 
go down at once, or drift away into the surrounding darkness, to 
struggle out the night as it could. I shall never forget that scene. 
All along the southern horizon between the black water and the 
blacker heavens was a white streak of tossing foam. Nearer 
and clearer every moment it boiled and roared on its tracks Be- 
tween it and us appeared at intervals that little boat like a black 
speck on the crest of the billows, and then sunk away apparently 
engulfed for ever. One moment the squall would seem to gain 
on it beyond the power of escape, and then delay its progress. 
As I stood and watched them both, and yet could not tell which 
would reach us first, the excitement amounted to perfect agony. 
Seconds seemed lengthened into hours. I could not look steadily 
on that gallant little crew now settling the question of life and 
death to themselves and perhaps to us, who would be left almost 
unmanned in the middle of the Atlantic, and encompassed by a 
storm, and again and again turned away from the appalhng spec- 
tacle. Every time she sunk from sight she carried my heart 
down with her, and when she remained a longer time than usual, 
I would think it was all over, and cover my eyes in horror — the 
next moment she would appear between us and the black rolling 
cloud literally covered with foam and spray. The Captain knew, 
as he said afterwards, that a few minutes more would decide the 
fate of his officers and crew. He called for his trumpet, and 
springing up the rattlings, shouted out over the roar of the blast 
and waves, " Pull away, my brave hullies, the squall is coming — 
give way, my hearties .''' and the bold fellows did " give way " 
with a will. I coijd see their ashen oars quiver as they rose 
from the water, while the life-like boat sprung to their strokes 
down the billows, like a panther oj^ the leap. On she came, and 



6 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

on came the blast. It was the wildest struggle I ever gazed on; 
but the gallant little boat conquered. Oh, how my heart leaped 
when she at length shot round the stern, and rising on a wave 
far above our lee quarter, shook the '.vater from her drenched 
head as if in delight to find her shelter acrain. 

The chains were fastened, and I never pulled with such right 
good will on a rope as on the one that brought that boat up the 
vessel's side. As the heads of the crew appeared over the bul- 
warks, I could have hugged the brave fellows in transport. As 
they stepped on deck, not a question was asked — no report given 
— but " Forward, men .'" broke from the Captain's lips. The 
vessel was trimmed to meet the blast, and we were again bound- 
ing on our way. If that squall had pursued the course of all the 
former ones, we must have lost our crew ; but when nearest the 
boat (and it seemed to me the foam was breaking not a hundred 
rods off) the wind suddenly veered, and held the cloud in check, 
so that it swung round close to our bows. The poor sailor was 
gone ; he came not back again. It was his birth-day (he was 
25 years old), and alas, it was his death-day. Whether, a bold 
swimmer, he saw at a distance his companions hunting hopelessly 
for him, and finally with his heart growing cold with despair, be- 
held them turn back to the ship, and the ship itself toss its spars 
away from him for ever, or whether the sea soon took him under, 
we know not. We saw him no more — and a gloojn fell on the 
whole ship. There were but few of us in all, and we felt his 
loss. It was a wild and dark night ; death had been among us, 
and had left us with sad and serious hearts. And as I walked 
to the stern, and looked back on the foam and tumult of the ves- 
sel's wake, in which the poor sailor had disappeared, I instinc- 
tively murmured the mariner's hymn, closing with the sincere 
prayer — 

" Oh ! sailor boy, sailor boy ; peace to thy soxil !" 

At length the winds lulled, the clouds broke away, and a large 
space of blue sky and bright stars appeared overhead. The 
dark storm-cloud hung along the distant hoiizon, over which the 
lightning still played, while the distant thunder broke at interval? 
over the deep. The black ocean moaned on in its heavy sobbings 



A YANKEE SAILOR. 



the drenched and staggering ship rolled heavily on its restless 
bosom, and the great night encompassed all. This was solitude 
so deep and awful that my heart seemed to throb audibly in my 
bosom. My eye ached with the effort to pierce the surrounding 
darkness, and find something to relieve the loneliness of the scene. 
At length the rising ipoon showed its bright disc over a cloud, 
tinging its black edge with silver, and pouring a sea of light on a 
sea of darkness, till the waves gleamed and sparkled as if just 
awakened to life and hope. The moon never looked so lovely 
before ; it seemed to have come out in the heavens on purpose to 
.bless and to cheer us. 

In a few days more we made the Azores, and then came long, 
wearisome calms, that were infinitely worse to bear than the 
storms. After lying for several days "a painted ship on a 
painted ocean," pining for action, or at least motion, I went in 
perfect despair to the forecastle, and begged the sailors to give 
me some work. I would saw wood, turn grindstone, do anything, 
to break up the dreadful apathy that had settled on the ship. I 
ground up every old axe and knife and tool there was on board. 
I was amply repaid, not only in the elasticity of feeling I gained, 
but in the knowledge I acquired of sailors' character. There 
was one tall, lank, regular Yankee among the crew, with a 
roguish twinkle to his small, half concealed eye, that told of many 
a sly trick. Whenever he left the wheel to go forward and I was 
on the quarter-deck, he would invariably, as he passed me, roll 
an enormous quid of tobacco fi'om his mouth into one hand, and, 
fetching it a box with the other, send it fer over the rail into the 
sea, and, at the same time, thrust his tongue into the vacant 
place, and toss me one of the drollest winks that ever set a theatre 
in a roar. One day I saw him making mats for the yards out of 
the ends of old ropes. " Well," said I, " George, so you keep 
to work." "Yes," he replied, "there is no rest for poor Jack ; 
if he can't play the Jarman flute he must whistle^' — i. e., if he 
can't do one thing, he must anotlier. Poor Jack ! his lot is a hard 
one. 

Yours, &;c. 



LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER n. 

The Straits and Rock of Gibraltar— Gulf of Genoa, &c. 

Genoa, October, 1842. 
0^-E morning we were awakened by the cry of land, and as 1 
stepped out of the cabin, the ragged mountains of Africa, the 
shores of Spain, the Straits of Gibraltar, and over all the glori- 
ous rising Sun burst on the sight. The steady current was set- 
ting rapidly for the Mediterranean, and all was silent around save 
the low crushing sound a hea.Yj tide always makes in its passage. 
The smoke that rose from burning timber on the hill tops and 
along the shore, gently inclined towards the Straits as if in- 
viting us to enter, while over all was t^at dreamy haze which 
smoothes even the roughest scenery into a quiet aspect. Our 
keel cut the waters where rode the keels of Lord Nelson's fleet 
before the battle of Trafalgar. Land was for a moment forgot- 
ten as my fancy painted the line-of-battle ships slowly moving to 
the conflict. I saw, or thought I saw the long row of banners 
floating in the breeze, the cloud of smoke as broadside after broad- 
side thundered over the sea. There were the broken and shiv- 
ered masts dangling amid the ropes, the cries of men, the roll of 
the drum, and the confused noise of battle. The mountains were 
alive with fearful echoes, and the waves ran blood. The cheer- 
ful voice of Mrs. L. beside me called back my erring fancy, and 
the quietness of a summer morning rested on all the scene. 
Whether it was owing to the fresh view of land, or the beauty of 
the day, or the scene itself, I know not, but that day was one of 
enchantment to me. Its remembrance is more like a rich dream 
than a past experience. There was a combination of scener}^, a 
succession of sensations followed by rapid associations that bore 
me away for a time like a child. I surrendered my heart to its 
impuses and let it regulate its own beatings. Distant mountains 



GIBRALTAR— GENOA. 9 

burying their heads in the smoky sky ; towers, fortresses, abrupt 
rocks, smiling villages ; vineyards in which nestled white cotta- 
ges 'j a continent on either hand and the blue Mediterranean be- 
fore me ; all coming or passing on my sight, and shifting every 
moment, made it seem like a wizard land. At length Gibral 
tar — that grey old solitary rock — stood before me. Lying some- 
what diagonal to the straits, and apparently isolated from the 
main land, it rose almost perpendicularly 1470 feet above me, 
cutting with its thin naked ridge the air in an irregular waving 
line. 

As we passed it, the booming of cannon came over the water 
and died away on the shore of Africa. That rock was to me for 
a while the centre of association. Grand and gloomy it stood 
and had stood while ages had slowly rolled away — itself alone 
unchanged. It once looked down on the Roman galleys and on 
the vessel that bore Csesar and his fortunes on. It had seen the 
pride of nations come and go with the same haughty indifference. 
It took no note of time, for time left not its mark upon it. 

Its stern gravity had not changed with changing empires. It 
had felt the shock of cannon, and the hot meeting of foes had 
made its sides red with the blood of men, and yet it retained its 
old composure. As I looked on its grey top, it seemed conscious 
of its own greatness, and to utter a silent mockery on the pride 
of man. It is now England's, but the hand that grasps it is slowly 
crumbling away. The conflicts for that mountain of stone are 
not yet ended. Whose next shall it be ? 

The night came, and with the full moon over our heads, on 
her way to the mountains of Grenada, we fled over the blue 
waters of the Mediterranean. Islands came and went — days and 
nights vanished away, till, with the mountains of Piedmont on 
our left, we slowly passed up the gulf of Genoa. One mornmg 
found us within a few miles of the city, and the approach to it 
fully sustained the character it had borne. The rising sun 
gilded the tops of the Apennines before us, and threw its light 
on the snow-clad summits of the Alps on our left, that lay pale, 
and white, and silent far up in the heavens. — The shores on 
either hand that bent up to the city were lined with villages — 
the back-ground of hills was belted with vineyards, and dotted 



10 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

with white churches and palaces ; while far distant before us 
mountain interlocked mountain, each naked ridge crowned with 
a fortress, and receding away till a sea of summits flowed along 
the distant sky. At the base was Genoa, * la swperha^^ throned 
like a queen upon her hills and looking down upon the sea. The 
city lies in the form of a half circle, and rises away from the 
shore like an amphitheatre. There is no plain, and it is but a 
short distance from the shore to the base of the hills. These are 
cultivated to their very tops, and literally covered with terraced 
gardens and palaces. As we drew near, the fragrance that fell 
down to the water was like the mingling of all sweet scents. 
This may seem almost a fancy sketch, but the first impressions, 
after a six weeks' voyage, of one of the loveliest scenes the sun 
ever shone upon, must be vivid but not necessarily overwrought. 
It was a holiday when we entered port, and added to all this 
beauty and sweetness, the chime of a hundred bells came merrily 
down to the bay. Yours, &;c. 



AN ITALlAJN WOMAN. 11 



LETTER III. 

First Impressions — An Italian "Woman — Lunatics. 

Genoa, October. 

OfiiR E. — I cannot convey to you the strange feelings wit 
\^ lich I first stepped on a foreign shore, and that shore, Italy, 
When one goes to Europe through England, he is gradually pre- 
pared for the strong contrast that exists betwacn his own country 
and the countries he visits. But I had no preparation; the last 
thousand miles of sea were just like the first thousand, and I had 
simply taken one step, and had passed from New York, with its 
English language and home habits, into Genoa, with its queer 
customs and unintelligible jargon. Everything was changed so 
suddenly, that I wandered about like one in a dream. Now a 
tall mustached officer, wrapped in his long military cloak, v/ould 
meet me, and eye me askance as he passed ; and now a black- 
robed priest shuffled by, not deigning me even a look as he went. 
How many times during the day have I stopped and questioned 
my own identity ! 

The other day I was leaning over the balcony of our window 
at the hotel, watching the motley groups that passed and repassed, 
and listening to the strange Genoese jargon that every one seemed 
to understand but myself, when my attention was attracted by an 
elegantly dressed woman who was sauntering leisurely along up 
the street that my window faced. As she came near, her eye 
fell on me, and, her curiosity apparently excited by my foreign 
look, she steadily scrutinized me as she approached. My appear- 
ance might have been somewhat outre, but still I did not think it 
was worth such a particular scrutiny, especially from a lady. 
But she had not the slightest concern about my thoughts on the 
matter. She wished simply to gratify her own curiosity; so 
when she had got within the most convenient reconnoitering dis- 



12 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

tance, she deliberately paused, and lifting her quizzing-glass to 
her eye, coolly scanned me from head to foot. When she had 
finished, she quietly replaced her glass in her belt, and with a 
smile of self-satisfaction on her face, walked on. 

Yesterday I visited the Lunatic Asylum, which stands in a val- 
ley between the outer and inner walls of the city. In this part 
of the city, the inner wall seems to have been built against a high 
bank, on the top of which the houses stand. This is fortified, and 
the space left on the top furnishes a beautiful carriage way and 
promenade, carrying you out to where the wall rises directly out 
of the Mediterranean, and giving you a view of the whole of the 
Ligurian Bay. From this promenade you can look down into the 
area of the Asylum. The building itself you will understand by 
comparing it to a wheel ; the centre building, oval in form, is the 
Tiub, from which radiate on every side, like spokes, sLy. long build- 
ings. Around the extremities of these, passes a circular wall, 
making, of course, between these radiating wings, six triangular 
areas. In each of these areas a certain class of lunatics are al- 
lowed to range : the mild are put together, and the violent kept 
by themselves. If any one becomes fractious, the strait-jacket is 
clapped on him, and he is turned loose again, with nothing but 
"his tongue and feet free. Nothing can present the contrasts of 
life stronger, than a stroll along this elevated promenade of a 
bright evening. The bright ]Mediterranean is sleeping like a 
Bummer lake as far as the eye can reach, and the feelings are 
lulled by the scene ajid the hour into tranquillity, when suddenly 
the sabbath stillness of the soul is broken by the scream of a rna- 
oiac, raving below you. Leaning over the low parapet thai 
guards this high wall, I often watch of an evening the laughing 
groups that fill the winding promenade before me, while shouts 
of mirth and bursts of music, coming at intervals on the night air, 
furnish strange interludes to the wild and confused accents thai 
fill the valley at my feet. 

But I liked to have forgotten my visit to the interior of the build- 
ing. The officer who showed me over it was a very civil man. 
The lower room of the central oval building is a chapel, into 
which the long halls from each of these wings enter. Among 
other peculiarities, I noticed one room with a wooden floor and 



.UKATICS. 13 



billiard table in the centre. Inquiring the design of this, I was 
told it was built for any insane gentleman, who could afford his own 
servant, and thirty francs a month for the use of it. Love 
and religion appeared to be the predominant causes of insanity. 
A poor creature sitting by herself, and counting her beads, had 
gone mad ca religion. Among the quiet class was a tall, fine, 
dark looking man, who slowly paced backwards and forwards 
with his head bent and his lips compressed, carrying an opei; 
letter in his hand. The profoundest melancholy sat on all hi^, 
features, and his tread was like that of a man to a funeral. In 
the full freshness and hope of life he had received by the same 
letter the news of the loss of his fortune, and the falseness of his 
betrothed bride. His mind had stopped at the end of that letter, 
and had never advanced another step — the one terrible calamity 
it revealed, filled his mind for ever after. Standing on one of the 
windows, and looking down into the area of the incurables, I saw 
at the farther extremity, under a sort of shed, two heaps of rags, 
lying at a short distance from each other. They covered two 
Vvomen, who went every morning as soon as they were released 
from their cells, to the self-same spot, and there, crouching close 
under the wall, lay silent and motionless till aroused again by 
their keepers. The history of one I could not learn. The othei 
was the wife of a gentleman, and had been in the Asylum sixteen 
years. I inquired why the husband did not furnish her with bet- 
ter clothing ? The officer replied that he did, and also paid a 
high price to have particular attention and service rendered her ; 
but the moment decent apparel was placed on her, she became 
wild with passion and refused all control until it was removed. 
This told her story, before the keeper related it to me. Young, 
lovely, and fiery-hearted, she had given her affections and oath 
to one who was her inferior in rank. But marriage is contracted 
here by the parents, and the daughter has no more voice in it 
than she had in her creation. This young and passionate crea- 
turD was thus bartered away. Usually in such cases, the woman 
considers herself sold by a mercenary parent, and clings to her 
lover, while she is willing her husband should also follow his in- 
clinations. And when we remember in what manner marriages 



14 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

are contracted in this country, looseness of morals in Italian wo- 
men should cease to surprise us. Of more fiery blood than we, 
they must love somebody. Hence if married to a man they can- 
not love, they soon choose a lover. But I am forgetting my poor 
lunatic. Her lover was a young and melancholy creature, and 
his passion was of that silent, almost gloomy character, which al- 
ways exalts or wrecks its victim. Without thinking of the fu- 
ture, he had cast every earthly hope — his entire being away 
upon this gay-hearted, high-spirited woman. The morning after 
she was led to the altar, she sat by her window with pale coun- 
tenance and swollen eyes, watching his coming. But he came 
no more. The heavy hours wore on, and at length a messenger 
came and told her he was dead. The night that made her a 
wife, made him a corpse. He had driven a stiletto through his 
heart — and to render his death still more heart-breaking, he had 
not left her a single line. Gloomy and reserved in his life, he 
scorned to complain in his death. The young bride went into a 
paroxyism of grief; she tore the bridal dress from her bosom, and 
the garland from her hair, and went raving mad. The storm 
had its passage, but when it wore off, black inanity and speechless 
silence took its place. And now for sixteen years had she lived, 
with a dead heart in her bosom. The hair had whitened on her 
head, and the wrinkles deepened on her cheeks, yet she changed 
not. The buried heart found no resurrection. 

As I stood gazing on that motionless form, wondering if thought 
was still busy there through the long days, my attention was di- 
rected by a sudden cry below me. I looked down, and there 
stood a woman stretching her hands up towards the window, her 
face working with passion, and crying " le chiavi, le chiavi " 
(the keys, the keys). The keeper was dangling the keys out of 
the window, and they had caught her attention. With the sight 
of those keys came the remembrance of the solitary cell and its 
gloom. What a symbol of terror they were to her ! 

I turned away, wrapt in reverie and sad at heart. Ah, happy 
is he, who can read the riddle of life, and make harmony and bliss 
out of its discord and suffering. But the throng of promenaders 
.hat soon surrounded me, and the excess of happiness that seemed 



LUNATICS. 



on every side, completely upset the theory I had just commenced 
weaving. 

'Tis midnight, and all is still as the moonlight sleeping on these 
old palaces — but now the chorus of some gay serenaders ringj 
through the streets. The echoes sink and swell along these mar 
ble mountains, and I must stop and listen. Good night. 

Yours, &c. 



W LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER IV. 

Genoa — Its Streets — People— Mode of Life, &c. 

Genoa, October. 

Dear E. — I have been three weeks in Genoa, and I suppose 1 
have not given you what is called a general description of the 
city. This I dislike most of all things — first, because it is indefi- 
nite ; second, because it is uninteresting. Genoa, as I stated in 
a former letter, lies in the form of a segment of a circle, and rises 
like an amphitheatre from the sea. The ground on which it rests 
is irregular, and there is not a level or a straight street in it. 
They wind and twist about like alleys in every direction. Hence 
a stranger has peculiar sensations in first wandering over the city. 
Unable to see out at either end of the street, and from the im- 
mense height of the houses, rising 70 or 80 feet on either side, 
unable to get an upper view, he feels at first as if threading the 
narrow passages of some dungeon, expecting every moment his 
path will open into daylight and freedom, and yet finding himself 
ever encompassed with dark grey walls. 

In some of these streets the sunlight never reaches the pave- 
ment, and in most of them the bats are flying at our dinner hour, 
whicli is three o'clock. Strada Balbi, Nuova and Nuovissima 
are magnificent streets, and lined with palaces almost the entire 
way. The wealth that built them was won from the East, by the 
commerce the Crusades opened into that countiy. With the ex- 
ception of Venice there is no city in the world equal to Genoa in 
its palaces. There is but one public promenade, called the Aqua 
Sola. It lies on the verge of the city, and is a beautiful place of 
resort. It is elevated above the surrounding streets, covering 
several acres, and looks out upon the mountains of Piedmont and 
the Gulf of Genoa. The whole city is surrounded by two walls ; 
one circling the city proper is six miles in circumference, the 



GENOA— ITS STREETS, ETC. 17 

other going over the hills is thirteen miles long. The gates are 
strongly fortified and constantly guarded. The shops of the town 
possess scarcely any beauty ; the largest could well nigh be put 
in the bow- window of a Broadway store. The basement stories 
of magnificent palaces are let out for hatters' shops, livery stables, 
and indeed everything — a main entrance only being reserved. 
The upper rooms alone are occupied. Genoa contains about 
100,000 inhabitants, one-seventh of whom are soldiers and priests. 
They are called the Yankees of Italy. Their great fault is they 
will cheat. You cannot trust them. It has passed into a proverb 
that " it takes seven Jews to cheat one Genoese." 

The females of the ordinary classes wear no bonnets in the 
streets, but in their stead a piece of muslin folded across the top 
of the head, called a mesure, and descending around the neck 
and over the shoulders in the form of a shawl. With only this 
protection, I have seen them lounging along the streets when the 
tramontane blowing fresh from the Alps made me shiver with my 
cloak wrapped close around me. This tramontane or north wind 
is very cold, and blows so furiously that ships lying in port are 
often compelled to heave out both a bow and stern anchor. But 
notwithstanding this and the vicinity of the mountains and the 
high latitude of Genoa, being above 44°, there is no snow in win- 
ter, and the poorer classes do without fuel the year round. This 
is partly owing to its dearness* Even the little necessary for 
cooking is hoarded with the greatest care. One day being in the 
country when a strong south-west wind was rolling a heavy surf 
on the shore, I saw groups of persons along the beach watching 
the approach of every wave, and, rushing after it as it retired, 
snatch something from the water. I could not imagine what prize 
could create so much interest. On approaching nearer I saw 
that the object? of their eager struggles were small chips ; some 
not bigger than half your hand, and small twigs the sea was 
throwing ashore. These they were gathering for fuel. So 
scarce and dear is it that none is used to heat water for washing 
clothes. They take all their garments out to the fresh streams, 
and on a pleasant day you will see groups of women from four to 
fifteen, lining the creeks on every side of the city. They tuck 
their dresses up above the knees, and kneeling down among the 



18 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

pebbles, take one large smooth stone for a washhoard, wrap it up 
in the article to be cleansed, and then begin to knead it. Al- 
though there is a great deal of wealth in Genoa, the poor are but 
little the better for it. 

The pay of a soldier is only a penny a day, and even the offi- 
cers, most of whom are poor nobles, receive but two francs, or 
two francs and a half, per day. Notwithstanding all these diffi- 
culties the common people seem contented and happy. There 
are no anxious brows as with us. Life and its obligations seem 
to sit lightly on an Italian. Each one being born into a rank, out 
of which it is difficult to rise, he makes no effort except to live. 
His anxieties seem to end with the gratification of his physical 
wants. He lives for the sake of living. He whistles care to the 
winds so long as he has food and clothing. With us each gener- 
ation is placed on one grand race-course — ^the prize being for all. 
Hence life becomes one long fierce struggle for pre-eminence. 
The same reward being offered to the lowest that is extended to 
the highest, it lashes every man to his utmost energy. Existence 
becomes a feverish excitement and the generation passes through 
life like a storm. — It is true " mountains are levelled, and seas 
are filled in its passage," but t?ere has tieen no repose and but 
little contentment. 



ROMANTIC MARRIAGE. J 9 



LETTER V. 

House-hunting — ^Romantic Marriage — Spanish Nobility. 

Dear E. — We have been house-hunting. Thinking it would 

be pleasanter to be in the country, L has been ransacking 

the country round for a pleasant residence. The Riviera, as it 
is called, or the shores of the Mediterranean, on either side of the 
city, furnishes the most charming place for country-seats in the 
world. The ground rises immediately from the sea, terraced, as 
it goes, into vineyards. After a vast deal of talking, riding, and 

seeing, L had finally concluded that one of two must be the 

choice ; so the next day we all got into a carriage, and rode 
out to see the one on the east side of the city. Passing by the 
grand and little Paradises, we emerged on to the sea shore, and 
trotted away for Noli. 

The building was finely furnished and commanded a beautiful 
prospect, but the entrance to it was from a narrow street, and 
Mrs. L threw in her veto (as all ladies in such circum- 
stances, you know, have a right to do). There is quite a little 
romance connected with this building. It was formerly erected 
and owned by a wealthy man, who was in the habit of visiting a 
beautiful peasant girl in the neighborhood. Pleased with his 
attention, she cast off, as ladies are very apt to do, the rustic 
lover she had before encouraged. But although her new admirer 
was frequent and steady in his visits, he never mentioned the 
subject of matrimony. Things went on in this way for three 
years, till one night the gentleman was startled, as he was about 
leaving the house, by the abrupt entrance of the two brothers of 
the inamorata, demanding that he should immediately marry 
their sister. They told him that he had- visited her for three 
years, thus keeping away other suitors, and destroying all hopes 
of their siriter's marriage except with him : three years were 



20 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

quite long enough for him to make up his mind in, and as he had 
not done it, they had concluded to do it for him. This was bring- 
ing things to a focus he had not anticipated. For a man of 
wealth and station to marry a poor peasant girl, merely because 
he condescended to be smitten by her beauty, was something more 
than a joke ; yet he saw at a glance that there was more meant 
by those brothers' speech than met the ear — in short, that his 
choice was to be a marriage or a stiletto through his heart. This 
was reducing things to the simplest terms ; rather too simple for 
the wealthy admirer. 

The trembling, weeping girl, the bold, reckless brothers, and 
the embarrassed gentleman, must have formed a capital group in 
a peasant's cottage. At length Signor attempted to com- 
promise the matter by saying that then was not the time, nor 
there the place, to celebrate such a ceremony ; besides there was 
no priest, and the proper way would be to talk over the subject 
together in the morning. One of the brothers leaned back and 
rapped slightly on a side door ; it opened, and a priest, with his 
noiseless, cat-like tread, entered the circle. *' Here is a priest," 
said the brothers. There was a short interval of silence, when 

Signor made a slight movement towards the door. T^^'o 

daggers instantly gleamed before him. He saw that it was all 
over with him — that the three years of courtship were going to 
amount to something after all — and so yielded with as good 
grace as possible, and the nuptials were performed. Like a man 
of sense, he immediately placed his wife in a convent to be edu- 
cated, while he, in the mean time, bought a title. Years passed 
by, and the ignorant peasant-girl emerged into the fashionable 
world, an accomplished woman. She is now a widow, and is 
called the beautiful Countess of . 

I was amused with an illustration of Italian character, in an 
incident that occurred while visiting another house that the owners 
wished to let. A woman showed us over the rooms and grounds, 
whose manners were much superior to those of a servant, while 
her dress was not. As this service is usually done by servants^ 

and indeed is one of the perquisites of their situation, L sup . 

posed, of course, that a fee was expected. Having no small 
change, he asked me to give her some money ; but there was 



AN INCIDENT. 21 



Bomething about the woman that made me instinctively shrink 
from doing it, so I gave him the piece and he presented it to 
her. She colored up to her very temples, smiled in most 
charming confusion, and discerning, with a woman's quick per- 
ception, the cause of the mistake, began to apologise for her 
dress, saying we had taken her quite by surprise. After all pos- 
sible apologies were made on our part, L turned to me, with 

a most comical look, and said in English, " I mistrusted as much, 
but really we are not to blame ; she need not dress so shocking- 
ly." A minute after she disappeard, leaving us strolling in the 
garden, mortified at our mistake, and regretting the shock we had 
given the dear creature's feelings. 

Judging her by ladies in general, we expected of course to 
see no more of her, and fancied her sitting within her room, look- 
ing the personification of contempt at our want of penetration. 
But silent contempt is not an Italian woman's mode of revenge. 
To our surprise, just as we were leaving the gate, a cheerful 
voice called out to us, and lo ! there came tripping up our abused 
lady, with some special information about the house, which she 
had forgotten to mention. The additional information, of course, 
was all smoke, but not so her personal appearance. In the short 
time she had been absent, she had doffed her sluttish apparel, es- 
pecially the villainous handkerchief she wore on her neck, and 
which would have ruined the beauty of Venus herself, and un- 
pinned her raven curls, which were left floating coquettishly 
about her shoulders, and advanced, showing the most brilliant set 
of teeth, and smiling, oh ! so naturally. The little witch knew 
she was handsome, and saw by our looks and most deferential air, 
that she had achieved a victory. She had doubled our mortifica- 
tion, and left us with the full belief that she was a downright 
handsome woman. 

This incident, trifling as it seemed, was a whole chapter on 
Italian character. An English or American woman would have 
treated the whole thing with sovereign contempt, and gained by 
it — notJiing ; for nobody but herself would have known it. An 
Italian woman has pride, but it works in an entirely different 
way. To her, dignity and woman's rights are nothing j but vie- 



LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



ory — everything ; and there is nothing she will not submit to, in 
irder to gain it. 

To-day we have been to look at a palace, six miles distant, on 
he other side of the city. It is now occupied by the family of 
in exiled Spanish duke, the duke himself having recently died. 
The entrance to it is through an iron gate, and up an avenue 
ined with hedges of box- wood and rows of trees. In front is a 
;emicircular area, filled with statuary, orange, lemon trees, and 
^rape vines. You ascend by a flight of steps into the lower en- 
rance, and then by a marble staircase into the grand reception 
•oom, which is hung round with old paintings. In one part of 
he building is a beautiful chapel. Entering at length the door 
)f the sitting-room, we beheld the two daughters of the old duke 
it their work. They rose as we entered, and two more striking 
ivomen I never met. They were dressed in deep mourning, and 
:heir raven hair was parted plain and smooth, over as polished 
3rows as ever sculptor perfected. 

Near by stands the old palace of Prince Doria, empty, and 
"ast sinking to ruins. The keeper of it found we were house- 
lunting, and sent to have us look at his " palazzo." It was well 
.vorth seeing, both for its antiquity and noble name ; but the 
Tiirrors were marred, the paintings moth-eaten, the old furniture 
•otted away, and the whole interior so forlorn and ruinous, that 
t made me shudder to walk through it. Up the long avenue 
hat stretched away below me, the mailed crusader had galloped 
Dn his war steed, and the area under the window had been filled 
tvith shaking lances. Knights and warriors had once made the 
room in which I sat ring with their revels. 

But while my fancy, as is usual in such cases, was galloping 
Dff at tip-top speed, it was suddenly brought to a dead stand-still, 

by L 's quietly drawing himself up and asking the attendant 

if he did not think the price asked for the old concern was rather 
"too high % Shade of Don Quixotte ! how knights, and high-born 
ladies, and fierce old crusaders, scampered away at that question ! 
I sat down and laughed, till the old keeper thought I was demented. 

L turned, half comical and half inquiring, towards me, and 

\ exclaimed, " Only think, Charlie — that old fellow is showing 
'his old princely palace over to us two young republicans, with 



DORIA PALACE. 23 



as much gravity and deference as if the blood of a thousand 
kings- flowed in our veins. Oh ! money, thou leveller of kings : 

nay, thyself a king ; ' every inch a king !' " " Well, J ," 

said my friend, " how would you like it here, any how V " Like 
it !" said I, " why, I should be frightened to death to stay here 
over night. I would no more sleep here, than I would sleep in a 
goblin castle. I should expect to sink through six or seven floors 
before morning, and finally wake up a mile or two under ground." 

The grounds of the palace, however, were magnificent, and 
the fountains, and orange groves in them, and quiet lakes, with 
their fairy islands and shady walks, were becoming a prince's re- 
treat. , You could walk miles under the shade of trees, amid 
fountains and statuary, without retracing the steps. 

To-night we have had a council over the different places of 
residence. They were all finally reduced to two, and the veto 
power lay of course in Mrs. L 's hands. L stoutly de- 
clared that my vote was worth nothing, as it would be thrown of 
course for the palace in which the two beautiful Spaniards were. 

Mrs. L , however, decided on that herself, and so, as we say 

at home, the thing "is fixec," and we move our traps next week. 

Yours, &c. 



34 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER VL 

Fimertl in the Morning — Murder of an American Officer 

Dear E. — "We have been three weeks in our home, and a 
charming one it is for this country. The grounds are terraced 
up behind it, to the top of a hill, where there is a semicircular 
area fringed with a hedge of box-wood, and filled with seats, de- 
signed for pic-nic parties. The view from this spot is like the 
vision of a dream-land. All the sea-shore is below you, dotted 
with white villages, and the bay stretches off into the open sea, 
while the snow-capped Alps are folding their summits together 
on the far distant heavens. Grape-covered walks interlace the 
grounds in every direction, and the yellow orange and lemon 
hang in profusion before our windows. The building has nearly 
thirty rooms in it, all furnished, and some of them very richly, 
and the rent is a trifle over 8360 per annum ; so break up your 
establishment in Broadway instanter — half its expense will en- 
able you to live here like a prince. 

It takes some time to accustom one's self to these immense 
rooms. There are but three of us, and three servants, in all, 
and it seems impossible to expand ourselves to the size of the 
building. Mr. L., wife, and nurse, occupy rooms on one side of 
the house, while I am all alone on the other side. The slamming 
of the great doors, ringing through the vast halls as I go to 
bed, makes me nervous. I do not like things on so large a 
scale. Our dining-table is so immense, that we almost need a 
tinimpet to hail each other across it. One of your snug Ameri- 
can houses, made on purpose for comfort, is worth a dozen of 
them. 

The palace of the Marquis of PalaTicini stands on a hill oppo- 
site us, the bells of whose chapel seem to take a peculiar pleasure 
in ringing after midnight. If the good Marquis expects to keep 



MURDER OF AN AMERICAN OFFICER. 25 

the saint for whose benefit they are rung, quiet in his grave, by 
these nocturnal rope-pullings, he must liave a singular idea of 
the way dead folks sleep ; yet I can almost forgive the disturb- 
ance, for the chimes will sometimes be so sweet and musical, that 
they mingle in my dreams, and sink away into my spirit like the 
memory of young joys. 

This morning I was awakened by that mysterious solemn chant 
heard nowhere but in Catholic countries : rousing me out of my 
sleep while my room was yet dark, it had an indescribable effect 
upon my feelings, I jumped out of Wed, and throwing open the 
shutters, beheld a funeral train winding along through one cornel 
of our garden — their long wax tapers burning dimly in the grey 
twilight of morning. One of the peasantry had died, and the 
friends were bearing the corpse, wrapped in white, to a neigh- 
boring church. Females, robed in white, with long white mus- 
lin shawl,-? folded across the top of the head, and falling down over 
their shoulders, accompanied the bier. The whole procession 
moved with a rapid step, while that strangely wild chant rose and 
fell in regular cadences on the air. It finally emerged from the 
vine-covered walks, and passing rapidly a bridge that spanned a 
rivulet at the bottom of the garden, disappeared on the other side. 
I turned to my bed again, but not to sleep. The ghostly chant 
awaking me out of my slumbers, had struck a superstitious chord 
in my heart, and that funeral train seemed to me like a visit and 
a warning from the spirit land, and left a sadness or me that I 
could not shake off. 

I left this letter unfinished to go to dinner, and while we were 
at table a carriage drove up, and a clerk of the Consular office 
was announced, bringing a note from the Vice-Consul, stating 
that our ]\Iediterranean fleet had just arrived from j\Iahon. This 
was stirring news, and we were soon en route for Genoa. It was 
too late for the Consul to board the fleet officially, and so we met 
Commodore Morgan and his lady on the wharf. The fleet has 
left Mahon on account of the assassination of one of our midship- 
men. The disbanded soldiers of the Spanish army are turned 
loose on the island, and become perfect cut-throats. The feeling 
among the officers against the government, on account of its per, 
feet indifference to the murder, threatened serious disturbances, 

3 



26 LETTERS FROM IIALY. 

and the Commodore wisely resolved to leave. The midshipman 
who was killed, seemed to have one of those mysterious warnings, 
which sometimes paralyze the heart of the stoutest warrior ju^t 
before an engagement. Owing to the lawless character of the 
inhabitants, the officers invariably wore side arms when they went 
ashore. Young Morrison, the afternoon he went ashore, appeared 
unusually sad, and just as he was about leaving the ship, the offi- 
cer, who related to me the circumstances, told him he had bettei 
take his pistols with him. He shook his head, and said seriously 
he did not need them. " But, surely," said his friend, " you are 
not going to leave your sword behind." He replied yes, and 
stepped into the boat. In the evening he was at a Cafe with sev- 
eral of the officers, and when they left, lingered behind a moment. 
The officers had not proceeded far, when (said my friend), " I 
heard a shriek behind me. The next moment young M. rushed 
by, exclaiming, ' I am killed,' and fell dead." His friends 
sprang back to seize the assassin, but found only a large Spanish 
knife on the ground, covered with blood. The murderer had 
fled. He had evidently watched young M. coming out of the 
Cafe unarmed, and stepping up behind in the dark, pinioned him 
tight with one arm, while, with the other, he rapidly gave him 
three stabs in the heart. The next day it was discovered that 
M. had taken out his Bible before he went ashore, and read it, 
and inserted between the leaves a short will, or parting request to 
hi^: friends, showing that he anticipated his death. So powerful 
anj mysterious was this impression, that he took pains to leave 
all his weapons behind him. He seemed to regard his death as 
fixed among the unalterable decrees. He had had no quarrel, 
and probably the only reason the assassin attacked him was, that 
he found him alone and unarmed. 

Some would find in this an evidence of tJie truth of omens and 
warnings, but if we could look through the causes that led to the 
impressions in this case, we might find it based on a superstitious 
notion received in infancy, or an incident slight as the tick of tho 
death-watch. It was of no consequence whether the cause of tho 
impression was reasonable, or not — it led him to that carclcsnesa 
and neglect, Mhich v/ould probably have secured the death of any 
officer. 



THE PEASANTRY 27 

»^«- "" ■ ■ — — 

20th. — To-day I have been back in the mountains among the 
poorer peasantry. Houses are scattered all through the hills, 
with nothing but paths leading to them from the sea. Pigs and 
chickens have free access, and they are. often the only inmates 
you see on the threshold. The situation of these hovels is highly 
picturesque. From the top of a ridge I would look down into a 
deep valley, and there, beside a brawling stream, all buried up 
in the vines, would nestle something that ought to have been a 
cottage, but which, alas, was a hovel. It is astonishing to see 
how the hill-sides in some places are cultivated. Patches, that 
look scarcely larger than the palm of your hand, spot the moun- 
tains in every direction. 

Chestnuts are quite a staple article for food. They are about 
three times as large as our chestnuts, and are eaten in almost 
every form, but usually roasted. They are also pounded up, and 
cooked into a sort of pudding. 

In general, the peasantry are more chaste than the other classes 
of Italians. The seducer may roam among the nobility, and un- 
less he treads on the toes of some peppery rival, acquires credit, 
rather than disgrace, by his conquests. But let him go among 
the peasantry, and his body will soon be found in the highway, 
with the marks of the knife on him. Among the poor, there are 
no matches of convenience, made by the parents, and in which 
virtue and love are entirely useless commodities. The peasant 
girl has nothing but her character to recommend her, and when 
that is gone, her hopes of marriage are gone. I must say, how- 
ever, that selfishness seems to have as much to do with their 
chastity, as virtuous principles, and perhaps more ; for after mar- 
riage, the same sensitiveness is not exhibited, and peccadi^oes, 
and love affairs, are the sources of endless quarrels, and often 
murders. 

21st. — Last night was a terrific night. An awful storm swept 
the sea and the shores. I stood by the window at midnight and 
gazed oft' on the waves that almost washed the foot of the garden. 
Every few moments the angry swell would fall in thunder on the 
beach, sending its foam to the roofs of the buildings that lined the 
shore. Perfect blackness would be resting on everything, when 
a sudden flash of lightning would light up the whole riviera and 



i8 LETTERS FROM ITALY 

bay, while the masts of a vessel struggling against the blast were 
painted out distinctly against the clouds. While I was gazing on 
this war of the elements, suddenly over the roar of the waves, 
and in the intervals of the thunder, came the dull report of cannon. 
It was a signal of distress. Some vessel at a distance was driving 
ashore, and that cannon-shot was her cry for help. Nothing can 
be sadder than to stand on land and hear above the tumult of the 
^torm, the minute gun of distress at sea. The staggering ship — 
,'error-stricken sailors and the wild death before them, rush over 
the fancy with every shot. 

I have heard this morning that a Marseilles vessel was wrecked 
in the storm, but only two of the crew perished. 

Yours, &c. 



CLARA NOVELLO. 29 



LETTER VII. 

The Carnival — Clara NoveUo — Isola the Painter, &c. 

Genoa, 1843. 

The Carnival here, as in all Italian cities, is the gay season of 
Jhe year. Balls, routes, masquerades, follow each other in quick 
succession. The Opera is at its height, and the whole population 
throw off their cares, and laugh, and dance, and sing, as if the 
world were a flower garden and Italy the brightest bower within 
its borders. Clara Novello has been the Prima Donna for the 
last half of the Carnival. Rome and Genoa had both, as they 
thought, engaged her for the season, and hence when each claimed 
her there was a collision. The two Governments took it up 
and finally it was referred to the Pope. It was a matter of some 
consequence to his Holiness where the sweet singer should open 
her mouth for the season. In his magnanimity he decided she 
should stay at Rome. The managers, however, compromised the 
matter by each city having her half the time. She had formerly 
been exceedingly popular here, but contrary to the will of the 
chief bass singer and thq leader of the orchestra, she attempted at 
her first appearance, an air unsuited to her voice, and which they 
told her she could not perform. Of course she failed and was 
slightly hissed. Her English blood* mounted at so unequivocal a 
demonstration of their opinion of her singing, and Dido-like, bow- 
ing haughtily to the crowd, she turned her back on the audience 
and walked off the stage. The tenor and the bass both stopped — • 
the orchestra stopped — indeed all stopped except the hissing, 
which waxed louder every moment. She was immediately taken 
to her rooms by the Police of the city, and for three days the 
gens-d'armes stood night and day at her door, keeping the fair 
singer a prisoner for her misconduct. This is a fair illustration 
of this government. Even an opera singer cannot pout without 

* Her mother was an English woman. 



30 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

having the gens-d'armes after her. On the promise of good be- 
havior, however, she was released from confinement and again 
appeared on the stage, where the good-natured, music-loving Ital- 
ians hailed her appearance with deafening cheers, and repaid 
their want of gallantry with excess of applause. 

Poor Clara Novello is not the first who has suffered from the 
tyranny of this military despotism. The other day I went to see 
the first painter of Genoa. He is a young man, modest, amiable^ 
and courteous, so much so that J became immediately deeply in 
terested in him. His name is Isola. He, too, has fallen once 
under the ban of the government. Like all geniuses he love? 
liberty; and the first great historical piece he painted and on 
which he designed to base his claim to be ranked among the firs', 
artists of his country, was a representation of the last great strug 
gle Genoa made for freedom. He showed me the design : in the 
foreorround with his horse fallen under him, strus^gled the foreign 
governor that had been imposed on the people, while the excited 
multitude were raining stones and missiles on him, and trampling 
him under foot. Farther back, and elevated on the canvass, 
stood the Marquis of Spinola, cheering on the people, one hand 
grasping the sword, the other waving aloft the flag of Freedom. 
Excited men were running hither and thither, through the crowded 
streets, and all the bustle and hurry of a rapid, heavy fight, 
were thrown upon the canvass. It was a spirited sketch, and 
one almost seemed to hear the battle cry of freemen, and the 
shout of victory. Such a picture immediately made a noise in 
Genoa, where yet slumber the elements of a Republic. It was 
finished, and admired by all, and treasured by the painter. But 
one day, while Isola was sitting before it, contemplating his work, 
and thinking what corrections might be r.iade, his door was burst 
open, and two gens-d'armes stood before him. Seizing the picture 
before his eyes they marched him off behind it, to answer for the 
crime of having painted his country battling for her rights. The 
painting was locked up in a room of the government, where it has 
ever since remained. Isola was carried between two gens-d'armes 
a hundred and twenty miles, to Turin, and thrown into prison. 
He was finally released, but his picture remains under lock and 
key. The government, however, liaSf in its magnanimity, con. 



ISOLA THE PAINTER, 31 

descended to permit the artist to sell it to any one who will carry 
it out of the country. Where shall it go ? I would that some 
American might purchase it. I spoke with him on the subject, 
and sympathized with him on the wrongs he had suffered. I 
spoke to him of my country, and the sympathy such a transac- 
tion would awaken in every grade of society, and invited him to 
go home with me, where he could breathe free, and his pencil 
move free, I promised him a welcome, and a reputation, and a 
home in a republic, whose struggle for freedom had never yet 
been in vain, and whose air would unfetter his spirit and expand 
his genius. 

Such language from a foreigner and a republican, he felt to be 
sincere. He turned his immensely large, black, and melancholy 
eyes on me, and attempted to reply. But his chin began to trem- 
ble, his voice quivered and stopped, his eyes filled with tears, 
and he turned away to hide his feelings. Oh, when I think of the 
cursed tyranny man practises on man — the brutal chain. Power 
puts on Genius — the slavery to which a crowned villain can and 
does subject the noblest souls that God lets visit the earth — I wish 
for a moment that supreme power were mine, that the wronged 
might be righted, and the noble yet helpless be placed beyond 
the reach of oppression and the torture of servility. 

The police of this kingdom is Argus-eyed. Gens-d'armes in 
disguise are in every coffee-house, and crowd, and party. Two 
nobles have lately been imprisoned for uttering a few careless 
words. These spies of tyranny are dogging your footsteps when 
you least expect it, and report your words long after they have 
been forgotten by yourself. So afraid is the king of the influence 
of republican principles, that he has despatched an order to his 
officers in Genoa to be on their guard and not be very familiar 
with the officers of our squadron. In consequence, many Geno- 
ese officers, who were exceedingly polite, all at once have become 
shy and distant. Only think of 60,000 soldiers to a population 
of about 400,000, and for a territory about the size of New York ! 
But these things will have an end. Dream as men will, the world 
is not merely marking time ; it is onward with a steady step to 
some goal. 

Yours, &</. 



32 LETTERS FRO:\I ITALY. 



LETTER VIIL 

Columbus' MantBcripts — ^Ride on Ilca^eback — Death in the Theatre. 

Cenoa, January, 1843. 

Deas E. — We are back in Genoa. The coming on of the 
rainy season and the gay season together, made it veiy uncom- 
fortable so far out of town. Besides, our fleet has moored itself 
for the winter in port, and many of its officers have their ladies 
with them, making quite an American society in the city. Our 
Charge at Turin and lady have" also come down to spend a month 
or two, so that American stock is quite up in the^ market. Last 
night I was at a tea-party on board the flag-ship, in the captain V 
cabin. There were eight or nine American ladies present, and 
nothing has reminded me so much of home since I left it. Com- 
modore Morgan is a frank, brave and noble-hearted man, and 
every inch a sailor. He has unfortunately been laid up with 
the gout since he arrived, and hence seldom appears in society ; 
but vrhen he does, his soldier-like bearing attracts universal at- 
tention. In the Tangier affair he has been more sinned against 
than simiing. Such officers also as Lieutenants Brown and Grif- 
fin, and others that might be named, are an honor to our flag 
wherever they carry it. I forgot to tell you that our " locum 
tenens'' is in Strada Balbi, nearly opposite the palace of the king ; 
nearer to it than I trust your house will ever stand to a royal pal- 
ace — at least while it stands on American soil. 

Horseback riding along this riviera is perfectly delicious. 1 
do not wonder that Byron and Lady Blessington preferred to take 
their "tete-a-tete'' on horseback alonsj this maii^nificent sea-shore. 
Yesterday, towards evening, I took a gallop with Mr. Duralde, 
a grandson of Henry Clay, and extending our ride farther than 
we anticipated, we did not return till in the dusk t^ the evening. 
Being somewhat in a burr}-, we er'vsd the city on a plunging 



COLUMBUS' MANUSCRIPTS. 33 

trot, and there being no carriages or horses in the street to inter- 
cept our progress, we did not slacken our speed. As we ap- 
proached a narrow street, into which we were to turn, I saw a 
little donkey ambling along with a load on his back ; but not 
dreaming he was going to interfere with my motions, I paid no at- 
tention to him till just as I was turning the corner, when, to my 
surprise, I saw him also wheeling into the same street, and not 
hugging the wall either so closely as I thought he might con- 
veniently have done. Being under full speed, I saw in a moment 
that a collision was inevitable ; but I supposed his donkeyship 
would have the worst of it, as I carried both more momentum 
and more weight. But the load I took to be some soft substance 
proved to be blocks of marble, against the corner of which my 
leg came with all the force a rapid trot could bring it. The don- 
key, load and all, went spinning into the corner of an old palace, 
but my leg was battered most cruelly by the blow. After I dis- 
mounted, I found myself unable to walk for a long time, and have 
limped ever since. This, you would say, should learn me to 
ride slower, while / would say, it should learn all donkeys to 
keep their own side of the road. 

The other day I went to see the manuscripts of Columbus, 
presented by him to the city of Genoa. They are kept in an 
aperture made in a marble shaft, that is surmounted by a bust 
of Columbus. The little brass door that shuts them in, can 
be opened only by means of three keys, which have been kept 
till lately by three different officers, in three different sections of 
the city; so highly is the legacy prized. These letters are written 
in bold, plain characters, and are filled with the noblest senti- 
ments. Several were translated to me, and one expression struck 
me as peculiarly characteristic of the man. Speaking of his 
preservation in his long voyages, and through his great perils, he 
says : " I am one of the most favored by the grace of God." I 
never held a treasure in my hand, that had to me such an ines 
timable value, as these noble letters of the noblest and greatest of 
men. 

I have seen and heard much of an Italian's love of music, but 
nothing illustrating it so forcibly as an incident that occurred last 
evening at the opera. In the midst of one of the scenes, a man 



34 LETTERS FROM ITA.LY. 

in the pit near the orchestra was suddenly seized with convul- 
sions. His limbs stiffened ; his eyes became set in his head, and 
stood wide open, staring at the ceiling like the eyes of a corpse ; 
while low and agonizing groans broke from his struggling bosom. 
The prima-donna came forward at that moment, but seeing this 
livid, death-stamped face before her, suddenly stopped, with a 
tragic look and start, that for once was perfectly natural. She 
turned to the bass-singer, and pointed out the frightful spectacle. 
He also started back in horror, and the prospect was that the 
opera would terminate on the spot ; but the scene that was just 
opening was the one in which the prima-donna was to make her 
great effort, and around which the whole interest of the play was 
gathered, and the spectators were determined not to be disap- 
pointed because one man was dying, and so shouted, " go on ! go 
on !" Clara Novello gave another look towards the groaning 
man, whose whole aspect was enough to freeze the blood, and 
then started off in her part. But the dying man grew worse and 
worse, and finally sprung bolt upright in his seat. A person sit- 
ting behind him, all-absorbed in the music, immediately placed 
his hands on his shoulders, pressed him down again, and held 
him firmly in his place. There he sat, pinioned fast, with his 
pale, corpse-like face upturned, in the midst of that gay assem- 
blage, and the foam rolling over his lips, while the braying of 
trumpets, and the voice of the singer, drowned the groans that 
were rending his bosom. At length the foam became streaked 
with blood as it oozed through his teeth, and the convulsive 
starts grew quicker and fiercer. But the man behind held him 
fast, while he gazed in perfect rapture on the singer, who now, 
like the ascending lark, was trying her loftiest strain. As it 
ended, the house rang with applause, and the man who had held 
down the poor writhing creature could contain his ecstacy no 
longer, and lifting his hands from his shoulders, clapped them 
rapidly together three or four times, crying out over the ears of 
the dying man, " Brava, brava !" and then hurriedly placed them 
back again to prevent his springing up, in his convulsive throes. 
It was a perfectly maddening spectacle, arid the music jarred on 
the chords of my heart like the blows of a hammer. But the 
song was ended, the effect secured, and so the spectators could at 



DEATH IN THE THEATRE. 35 

jend to the sufferer in their midst. The gens-d'armes entered, 
and carried him speechless and lifeless out of the theatre. If 
this be the refined nature, and sensitive soul, love of music 
creates, Heaven keep me from it, and my countrymen. Give me 
a heart, with chords that vibrate to human suffering, sooner than 
to the most ravishing melody, aye, that can hear nothing and feel 
nothing else, when moving Pity speaks. But so the world goes, 
— men will weep over a dying ass, then pitch a brother into the 
ditch. A play, oh, how they can appreciate, and feel it, they are 
&o sensitive, but a stern, stirring fact, they can look as coldly on 
as a statue ! 

The wife of our charge related to me the other day a curious 
illustration of an Italian's habit of crying " bravo" to everything 
that pleases him. During the winter there was a partial eclipse 
of the sun, and the Turinites were assembled on the public 
square to witness it. As the shadow of the moon slowly en- 
croached on the sun's disc, they cried out " bravo, bravo," as 
they would to a successful actor on the stage. 

A priest whom L considers a great bore has just left us. 

He has one of the most treacherous, sinister-looking black eyes 
I ever saw in a human head. Mrs. L says his presence af- 
fects her like that of a snake. I rather like him as a character, 
though I would not trust him an inch beyond his self-interest. 
He is honest in one thing, however — he says there is not a ghost 
of chance for a Protestant in the next world, and asserts that I 
am a gone man, with most provoking coolness. He will not let 
me stop even in purgatory, where the prayers of good Catholics 
might reach me, but shoves me straight past into the lowest pit 
of perdition. I laugh at his charity, and hope a better destiny 
for him. 

Tru y yours. 



36 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER IX. J 

A Day's Ramble through the City of Genoa. 

Genoa, January 10, 1843. 

Dear E. — I uo not know that I can give a better notion of the 
various little things you meet in Genoa, than by relating the in- 
cidents of a single day's promenade. 

Yesterday at two o'clock I started out into strada Balbi, and 
massing the king's palace, Durazzo, and Balbi, and other palaces, 
came at length to an open square, occupied as a Vettura stand, 
which was blocked with those old, shabby, shattered, rickety af- 
fairs called vetture. The horses standing before them, either eat- 
ing hay or looking as if they never had eaten any, seemed to 
have been carefully selected from all the smallest, oldest, sickest, 
poorest, laziest, rejected dray horses of the world. They all had 
on old Dutch harnesses, and many were supplied with rope 
traces and reins, while the dirty drivers looked like " scare-crows 
eloped from a corn-field." You would be amused to see one of 
these vehicles in motion. Built originally something like a com- 
mon hack, they have an additional sort of calash top, projecting 
over the seat of the driver, which, having a decidedly downward 
pitch, gives to the whole apparatus the appearance of diving at 
the horses. Take some of the oldest (and they seem cotempo- 
raries of the Ark) and get the team you would take for a pair o\ 
poor cows in full motion, and you would be astonished at the cer- 
tainty with which they reach their destination. It is wonderful to 
watch how the carriage will keep the general direction of the 
horses, without appearing to follow them at all. The great thing 
seems to be, to keep the main run of the street. If I should see 
a carriage at home performing such evolutions as these vetturas 
often do, I should certainly halloo to the driver to hold up, in 
honest fear for his safety. 



A DAY IN GENOA. 37 

As I passed this stand I was hailed of course, like a passenger 
at a steamboat landing, with " a Milano, a Torino, a Lucca, a 
Pegli," &;c. To the d — 1, said a rough voice behind me. It 
came frorii an Englishman, who was running the same gauntlet 
with mywif. He cursed, while I laughed involuntarily, thinking 
of New York, and wondering what the good people of Gotham 
would pay to see such scare-crow establishments in their streets, 
offered to their -service. 

Leaving this rabble, I came to a bend in the street where Balbi 
is cbanged into i^uovissima. In the side of the wall, in the cor- 
ner, is a fountak<i, at which women stood washing clothes, with 
as much uncoi;cern as if they were not in the Broadway of 
Genoa. 

Coming to f K^ther open space where the street takes the name 
of Nuova, on which there is not a building but a palace, I saw a 
group of men in that oval shape which always indicates some- 
thing of intptcst in the centre. This is a law of bipeds, and 
knowing i{f universality, I stepped up to look in with the rest. 
In tlie ceij'Te was a Neapolitan with " twa dogs," which he af- 
firmed came from the uttermost parts of the earth, even from 
America. 1 thought very likely, for one resembled a common 
bull pup, and the other looked like an ordinary black whiffet. 
The black "one was walking with the most ludicrous gravity 
around the circle on his fore legs, while his hinder parts were 
elevated in the air. After he had finished his promenade, the 
man made a regular stump speech and then introduced the bull 
pup. He called him up and asked him if he liked tobacco. 
The little fellow lazily lifted up his fore paws to the man's knees 
and sneezed. 

He then asked him if he liked maccaroni. He slowly turned 
up his eye, as much as to say, '- What an insult !" and then de- 
liberately yawned. " Now," said he to the dog, " we will have 
some music." On the ground was a piece of carpet, and on the 
carpet a sort of harp, with a piece of written music fastened at 
tlie top. The man knelt on one knee, and played an old, broken- 
winded clarionet, giving at the same time a wink to the dog. 
The little fellow, with all the gravity, if not grace, of a Miss at 
a piano, squatted 5own on his hind lesjs, and, laying bis little eais 



38 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

back, lifted his fore paws to the harp and played, or rather pawed 
a sort of running accompaniment to the tune, amid peals of 
laughter. I shook my head at the man's first statement, and 
however much pride I might take in owning such remarkable 
pups as fellow-citizens, I knew none but a dog, born and educated 
in a land of fine arts and song, could learn music so early. It 
was an Italian dog and no other. I passed on through strada 
Nuova, and, turning to the left, came to another open space and 
another group of men, women and children. In the centre of 
this were a boy and girl, brother and sister, about ten and four- 
teen years of age ; and they too were " getting a living." They 
were from the Savoy Mountains. The girl had a sort of hand- 
organ swung around her neck, resembling an old unpainted box, 
out of which she was grinding music, which she accompanied 
with her voice, and oh, such singing ! The little, shabby, dirty 
thing, stood with her sun-burnt, pox-pitted face screwed up into 
a most tragical expression, and shooting forward at intervals, like 
the opening of a knife blade, to give force to her words, while the 
strained cords stood out like sentinels on her brown neck and bo- 
som. The ragged urchin also had a box strapped around his 
neck, in which was a veritable " coon," that he made dance and 
whirl to the music. A few steps more brought me on to the 
grand promenade, " aqua sola" (solitary water), under which 
rest the mouldering bones of 80,000 people, who were swept 
away by one pestilence. Around me were fountains and flowers ; 
above me the terraced hills, and far away the sparkling sea. It 
was poetry all, even to the far off and glorious sky. Just then I 
stumbled on a group of women and children, sitting against the 
sunny side of a wall, looking heads, and from the appearance they 
seemed remarkably successful. This, too, is Italy, I exclaimed, 
as I turned into another walk, that overlooked the "' Grand Para- 
dise," and the residence of Lord Byron. But here, also, I was 
met by another Italian in the shape of a woman — a beggar — and 
resembling more a dirty, ragged Indian squaw than an Italian 
Her sun-burnt hair hung over her face and shoulders, while an 
old woollen blanket, that extended from her head nearly to her 
bare feet, served partially to conceal the rags that covered ner. 
She threw her head on one side, held out her liand, and in a 



A DAY IN GENOA. 



pitiful tone exclaimed, "per carita, Signore, mi miserabile." Mis- 
erable enough she seemed, but as I did not immeaiately grant 
her request, she began to try the effect of a little English, for 
■which she had our Navy to thank. The first words sailors teach 
are oaths, and they are the only words she knew 'without knowing 
their meaning. " I say, Signore," she whined, "I say per carita, 
God damn." I turned away, sick with the lessons Americans! 
teach the wretched of other lands. 

I turned towards the sea again, and felt I was in Italy ; for 
there were the beautiful latines dotting the bosom of the water 
like swans, and with their one great white sail, that looked like 
a wing, flying on their Avay. It was now late in the afternoon^ 
but the sun was warm, and a gentle south breeze coming up 
the Gulf, bland and soft as a June wind ; and so I turned to 
ascend the mountain that forms the amphitheatre behind Genoa, 
and which overlooks the entire city, and port, and neighboring 
sea. 

It was a lonof and toilsome walk. The close hio-h walls that 
hemmed in the path, mocked every effort to catch a glimpse of 
the beautiful scene that I knew was spread out below me. At 
length I reached the summit ; and oh, what a vision lay at my 
feet ! Beggars and street-singers — all were forgotten. Palaces, 
and towers, and gardens, and vineyards, and coming and depart- 
ing vessels, were crowded into one '' coup d'.oeil.'' On the right 
stretched away the beautiful riviera tow^ards Nice, sprinkled with 
villages. In front was the sea, washing the base of the Alps, 
that stood like "earth's gigantic sentinels," with their white hel- 
mets on, flashing in the clear air and light of the upper regions. 
Below me were the city and port of Genoa ; behind me the bleak, 
grey Apennines, piled and packed against the clear sky. On 
every side between me and the city, were terraced vineyards 
and gardens. The sun was going to his bed behind the Alps, 
bathing the whole southern horizon in gold, which was reflected 
again in the still water. I watched him till his disc disappeared 
behind a snow peak, leaving a momentary glow of fire on a grey 
fort that frowned from the summit of a mountain near me, and 
then turned to the panorama below. A long train of mules issued 
from the city gates, and wound in single £le along th-^ "^^'iera — • 



40 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

the tinkle of their bells coming faint and low at intervals to my 
ear on the light breeze that ascended (he hill. On every side 
peasants were returning home ; some along the dim shore, and 
some winding up the mountain-paths. The muflled sound of 
carriage-wheels and the murmur of busy men struggled out of 
the close packed city as the night descended upon it. At length 
the evening chime of bells rose and trembled over its marble 
palaces, drowning every other sound with its louder melody. 

I stayed on the hill-top watching the changing scene till dark- 
ness closed over the whole. At length the lantern of the immense 
light-house threw its flame over the sea and port, and the full 
moon seemed to leap above the Apennines, casting its deeper light 
and shade, on mountain, sea and city. 

I descended to the town to end the poetry of an Italian day in 
a cafe, over a cup of coffee. But all the varieties of an Italian 
life had not yet been presented to me. With Italians, poetry and 
music do not end at the door of an eating-house. While I was qui- 
etly sipping my coffee, a group entered ; .a man and boy with a 
flute and violin, and a young woman with a guitar, all from the 
mountains of Piedmont. They played and sang their mountain- 
airs, till I began to dream of rocks, and jutting crags, and climb- 
ing goats, and eagle-nested huts, and brawling torrents, and every- 
thing in a wild, free existence. But alas, for the poetry of life ! 
So buried was 1 in my thoughts, that I did not notice the cessation 
of the song, but sat twirling my spoon in my cup, wondering if 
it were not better at once to find some quiet nook among the hills, 
and, Rousseau-like, dream away existence, when the spell was bro- 
ken by the soft voice of the Piedmontese beside me. I looked up, 
and there she stood, with a little pewter dish in her hand, most 
humbly asking for a few sous. Oh ! pretty Piedmontese, what a 
fall you gave me ! I threw her the coppers, shoved vexatiously 
vny cup aside, and hastened into the streets. All this, too, was 
*' for a consideration." Bah! Land of Song ! Yes, truly ; but 
your inspiration is money. And what is man's boasted independ- 
ence of will, when so slight a thing can for the moment make a 
jest of all his resolutions, and wind him, like a wand, around an 
impulse ! I turned to my lodgings, with three Swiss peasant? 
before me singing lazily along. Two carried two different parts, 



A DAY IN GENOA. 41 

while the third would ever and anon fling in his deep, heavy basg 
voice, by way of chorus. These did not seem to be singing for 
money ; but I could not enjoy it, and, weary and exhausted, I 
thought there was no poetry in the world like the poetry of sleep. 
I have gone over these little things, because they are the best 
illustrations of Italian character. In just about this proportion 
are its music, and scenery, and beggars, and wretches mingled. 
It is a land of great contrasts. The people, with their poetry 
and music, seem to me like a speculator in an old Athenian tem- 
ple, selling its rich ornaments, that were the objects of his ances- 
tors' affection and veneration, like the trinkets of a toy-shop. The 
language of Italy was made by poets, and is of itself sufficient 
to render its people effeminate. Its singing has not been exag- 
gerated. It seems as natural for an Italian to sing as for a duck 
to swim, and he enjoys music with a relish we are ignorant of. 
Some favorite air from Bellini or Rossini will be hummed by a 
ragged urchin in the streets, or ground out by one of those hand- 
organs that meet you at every turn. The Italians are, after all, 
a happy people, and, like the French, seem to live only for the 
present. The United States they consider as out of the world, 
and its inhabitants only half civilized. They shrug the shoulder 
when you speak of its frost, and sing on in their own mild clime. 
An Italian speculator the other day was inquiring of me how 
cold New York was, for he had had the intention of trying to 
grow mulberry-trees in it. I told him the thermometer didn't 
generally fall more than 20*^ below zero. " Per Baccho," said 
he, with an expression and a shrug, as if he already felt the ice 
around him ; " it will never do." The last I heard of him, he 
had started for Caraccas. He will doubtless fmd it warm 
enough there. 

Truly yours. 



LETTERS FR031 ITALY 



LETTER X. 

Italian Soirees and BeauU- — Marquis of Palavicini — Lew Life. 

Genoa, February, 1841. 
Dear E. — I suppose you are wondering I say no more of the 
Carnival and its gaities, but nothing is more stupid than an Ital- 
ian soiree. Conversation is mere twaddle ; and dancing, and 
waltzing, and music, are the three great elements of Italian so- 
ciety. ^Masquerades and balls are common among every class, 
down to the half-clad becro-ar. 

CO 

The Governor's soirees twice a week, the Marquis di Negro's 
once a week, and the grand balls of the Casino, of which there 
are but three during the winter, are the three principal places of 
the resort of the nobility. 

My first introduction in society was at the old Doge's Palace. 
As I entered through the grand gateway, guarded by soldiers with 
their glittering arms, and passed through the long line of Porta- 
tine, or sedan chairs, arranged on each side of the walk, from 
which were emerging closely veiled figures; and ascended the 
long and magnificent marble steps, amid the presenting of arms, 
into the entrance chamber, filled with liveried servants: I expected 
to be dazzled with such an array of beauty as never before blessed 
the eye of man — unless it was King Solomon in the midst of his 
Harem. Indeed my accustomed self-confidence was fast ooz- 
ing out, and I have no doubt I should have committed some 
blunder had not Antonio, like a capital valet as he was, done 
cver^'thing in its proper time. I first entered a large saloon, and, 
lo ! it was filled to overflowing with nothing but officers in their 
uniform. I wandered on till I came to the '-'ladies' room," and 
it is no more sad than true, there was not a really pretty woman 
in it. I must acknowledge, however, there were not many pres. 
ent. The Governor, whether he noticed my disappointment or 



ITALIAN SOIREES. 43 



wished to be civil, I know not, said, " You must come next Mon- 
day evening ; this is a ' conversazione,' and there are but a few la- 
dies here — Monday evening we have a Ball, and there will be 
more present." Just then a beautiful creature swept into the 
room, and the Baroness of L was announced. As she sa- 
luted the Governor and passed on, he whispered to me, " A very 
beautiful woman." " Very beautiful," I replied, at the same 
time drawing a long breath, like one relieved from a long sus* 
pense, and very glad for the opportunity of making such a remark. 
But she was a Russian Baroness on a visit to the Governor, and 
not an Italian. I need not say, that the next Monday I did not 
go. Indeed his soirees, which are twice a week during Carnival, 
I find so excessively stupid, that unless I am sure of some extra 
attraction, I seldom attend. The majority of gentlemen present 
are officers of the army, who are compelled to attend, so that his 
Excellency's rooms may not be left empty. The poor fellows sit 
around the rooms like statues — looking as if it were the hard- 
est duty they had to perform. These " Conversazioni" do not 
tempt one by the refreshments furnished ; for I verily believe 
that ten dollars would pay, each evening, all the expenses the 
Governor is at in the entertainment. 

The other evening I was at an unusually brilliant assembly at 
the Palace of the Governor ; and as I was standing amid a group 
of officers, I caught a view of a head and face that drew from me an 
involuntary exclamation. There was a beauty and expression about 
it I never had seen but once in njy life before ; but no one could 
tell me who she was or where she came from ; yet all looked as 
if they would give the world to know. At length seeing her 
seated in familiar conversation beside a lady with whom. I was 
acquainted, I soon pierced the mystery that surrounded her. You 
can guess my surprise and pleasure to learn that this beauty was 
of American origin. She was the daughter of Lord Erskine, 
Minister to the Court of Vienna. When Minister to the United 
States he married a beautiful Philadelphia lady (daughter of Mr. 
Cadvvallader), who, it seems, had transmitted the charms that had 
enthralled the noble lord to the daughter. You can judge of the 
effect of American beauty on the Italians, when I tell you,' 
that while I stood by her, the young nobles marched by in regu- 



44 LETTEflS FROM ITALY. 

lar platoons, and paused as they came opposite her, and gazed as 
if moon-struck. The radiant creature sat " quite unconscious of 
all this, of course,'^ as the lady sitting by her side not very ami- 
ably whispered to me. 

Last night the annual Ball was given by the Governor at his 
Palace, and there were many beautiful women present. At that 
time alone, during the whole year, unless in court, do the nobility 
wear the family jewels. On this night they are all exhibited on 
the necks, heads, and arms of the matrons and their daughters. It 
makes a perfect blaze of diamonds. The nobility of G^enoa are 
among the richest of Italy, for the wealth the crusades opened to 
them in the East is still gathered here. Such a profusion of or- 
nament I never beheld. There, for the first time, I saw the ielle 
of the city — the Marchioness of Balbi. I was glad to see what 
the Italians regarded as beauty, and was surprised to find that 
she had the light complexion and rosy cheeks of the Saxon race. 
She was beautiful — very, but of that kind of beauty I do not par- 
ticularly admire ; it was, what I would term, of the doll kind. 
But oh, such spirits, and such a dazzling quantity of diamonds ; 
one almost needed to shield his eyes to look on her. The value 
of them was variously estimated, but the average estimate seemed 
to put them at about two hundred thousand dollars. But even 
her diamonds could not outshine the sparkling joy of her counte- 
nance. I never saw a being float so through a saloon, as if her 
body were a feather and her soul the zephyr that wafted it. It 
made me si^h to look on her. Such aboundinor craietv — such 
thrilling mirth ! — I knew it could not last ; this world was not 
made for it. The next time I saw her she was in deep mourning, 
with her head bowed down like a bulrush. The bloom had gone 
from her cheek, and the light from her eye. She vanished from 
the gay world like a stricken bird. Her brother, the Marquis of 
Palavicini — one of the noblest young men I ever met — liberal in 
his feelings and handsome in his person — the pride and hopr? of 
his family — suddenly died. I saw him last at the Marquis di 
Negro's. As I bade him good evening I was struck with the ex- 
pression of his countenance ; it had a look so intensely anxious 
that It fixed my attention. This was Friday evening. Sabbath 



MARQUIS OF PALAVICINI. 45 

morning a mutual friend called on me and told me he was dead ' 
So we vanish, like ghosts at cock-crowing. 

He was extravagantly wealthy, yet simple as *he severest re- 
publican in his appearance and habits. I never left him, after a 
conversation, without feeling that he was destined to affect ma- 
terially the fate of his country. There was a high principle, and 
a resolute will in him, that always generates great and energetic 
action. I shall never forget the effect of a remark of his to me, 
and the manner of it, one evening, in one of the brilliantly illu- 
minated rooms of the Governor's palace. Amid the dense throng 
of men on every side, you could detect scarcely one not in mili- 
tary uniform. The young Marquis was standing alone in the 
centre of the room, leaning against a billiard table, and absorbed 
apparently in deep thought, yet with an expression of scorn in 
his features, perfectly withering. I stepped up and addressed 
him' ; and after returning my salutation he remarked, with a tone 
that showed it was caused by no passing feeling, " How contempti- 
ble is a nation of soldiers, and how pitiful the state of a people among 
whom the uniform of an officer is the highest mark of honor. '^ 
I looked at him in astonishment. For a remark less treasonable 
than that, many a noble, during the past few years, had seen the 
inside of a prison. That declaration acted upon would revolu- 
tionize Italy in two months. I turned away, feeling that good 
would yet come out of that proud young Marquis, or evil to him. 

But he is gone, and one of the most frequent regrets I hear ex- 
pressed is, that his sister cannot now give the series of splendid 
entertainments she had in preparation. 

The cause of his death has checked somewhat the flow of vis- 
itors to our fleet. The young Marquis dined one day, with 
several of the nobility, on board of one of our ships, and, unac- 
customed to our strong wines, drank till his blood became over- 
heated. In the evening, when he came ashore, he went up on 
the " Aqua Sola," where the wind had a fair sweep, and sat 
down to cool himself. He took cold — became deranged, and was 
hurried out of the world. 

Perhaps you complain that I do not give you more particulars 
of fashionable society, but it is all alike — splendid rooms, bril- 
liantly illuminated, any quantity of pobility — dancing, waltzing, 



46 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

promenading, ice creams, hot punch, and late hours, make up the 
description. It is gay and brilliant, but without force or wit. 
You would probably agree with Antonio in his opinion of my 
taste in such matters. He was very much shocked, the other 
evening, as we were without the city walls purchasing some 
things for Mrs. L. (who is very sick), because I asked him to ac- 
company me into a low, dirty hovel, from which was issuing the 
sound of boisterous merriment. He expostulated with me ; and 
in answer to all my reasons, exclaimed, they are " la bassa gente, 
signore," (low people). *' Exactly," said I, " and that is the 
very reason I wish to see them. High life is plenty in Genoa, I 
can see that any time ; I want to become acquainted with low 
life." Willing, however, that he should not be disgraced by be- 
ing seen with persons so far below his rank, I excused him from 
accompanying me, and told him I would go alone. But he was 
too well trained to think of such a thing, and so, without farther 
ado, marched on. You should have seen the infinite contempt 
with which he deposited the entrance fee, and pushed aside the 
blanket that served for a door, and entered. All the while we 
were there he stood with his hat on, and rolling from side to side 
with a kind of swagger, as much as to say, " I don't care what 
the tastes of those who would call themselves gentlemen may be, 
but if I were called upon, I should have no hesitation in express- 
ing my opinion on the matter." The poor fellow really suffered 
in his feelings. 

The scene was very much like those I have seen in the quar 
terings of slaves at the South on the evening of a holiday. The 
floor was the bare earth, and the dancers and waltzers that spun 
around on it were most of them bare-foot ; while m.any of the 
men, with the utmost care in their toilet, could muster only a 
shirt and a pair of pantaloons. The entrance fee, I think, was 
'bur centisima, or four-fifths of a cent. Truly yours. 



ODD BROKERS. 4T 



LETTER XL 

Odd Brokers— Terriiiic Storm— A Catholic miracle. 

February. 

Dear E. — I have discovered a new class of brokers, often in 
great demand here, and who frequently make handsome specula- 
tions. You may confide the secret to a few particular friends for 
their exclusive benefit, or you may give it to the world for the 
good of the public. I received my information from an Italian — 
a Catholic, and a man of rank, so it can be relied on. 

There are certain monks, priests, and friars, in this country, 
ready to do any job, provided it pays well. Now it often happens 
that a man wishes to pay his addresses to a lady, and finds obsta- 
cles in the lady herself or in her friends. In either case he en- 
lists a monk in his service, who, having access where he is denied 
entrance, and influence where he has none, carries on the nego- 
tiations under more favorable auspices. Through his office, he 
can bring some motives to bear on the parents that the lover could 
not use ; and if communication with the lady is desired, he is sure 
to bring it about. A good catholic would hardly think of turning 
a priest out of doors, or presume to question him too closely on 
his actions. He also, through pretence of administering spiritual 
consolation, can often gain her ear ; and if it should so happen 
that she herself should be averse to the suitor's prayer, he can 
work on her fears or feelings " ad libitum." This he does, and 
often brings about a marriage that otherwise would never have 
taken place. It matters not whether love or money be the mov- 
ing cause of the man's wishes; if the priest secures the lady he 
has three per cent, on all the dowry she brings to the husband. 
Custom has fixed this rate till it is absolute as law, so that if a 
monk is the means of securing but one large fortune for a mai; in 
his life-time, he gets for himself quite a snug little supa against a 



48 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

i^ainy day. Now why not introduce this at home, and establish 
a new brokerage system. I know many lazy loungers in Broads 
way, who would not hesitate a moment to give even more than 
three per cent, of the fortunes they try in vain to touch, if some 
one would only find means to put one of them in their hands. 
To be sure it would require men of acknowledged taste, and some 
character, to be successful in such matters. But this makes it so 
much the better. It would be decidedly a genteel business. A 
good deal of flattery, some fraud, and a vast deal of manoeuvring, 
would, of course, be requisite. A proud mama must be wheedled 
into the belief that her daughter will make a great " speck " by 
the marriage, or the close-fisted suspicious old Jew of a father 
convinced that the young man is a perfect pattern of economy — 
but then three or perhaps six per cent, on 8200,000 ! — that's the 
point. This matter is now left too much in the hands of friends, 
who do not make a thorough business of it, and hence do not suc- 
ceed. I give you the suggestion for what it is worth, only if it is 
acted on and succeeds, see that I have the credit of it. 

As I am speaking of priests, I will give you another instance 
of the value of their services to the country. Last week a most 
terrific storm visited Genoa ; nothing like it has been known since 
the terrible hurricane of 1823. It came from the southwest, 
bringing the sea with it, and rolling it up against the base of 
these mountains as if it would drive them from their seats. Some- 
times you would almost need a candle at mid-day, so dense and 
dark were the clouds that hung over the city. Endeavoring to 
walk around the outer wall of the town that overhangs the sea, I 
was often compelled to lie flat on my face, to keep from being' 
carried ofl* my feet, and borne away by the blast. This wall rises 
thirty or forty feet from the water, and from its top the houses go 
up fifty and sixty feet higher, and yet the spray and foam would 
often rise and shoot clean over the roofs of the houses, and be 
carried by the wind far into the city. The moles that form the 
harbor, with the sea breaking over them, looked more like snow- 
drifts, with the snow shooting in horizontal lines from their sum- 
mits. The two light-houses on them, were half the time merely 
lofty pyramids of foam, with lantern and all buried under the leap- 
ing wave. The flag ship, Columbus, parted two of her cables in one 



A STORM AND A MIRACLE. 49 

night, although lying snugly in port. One ship parted her an- 
chor, and came dashing against the wails of the city. Her masts 
fell at the first shock, and in the morning I saw her hull, shivered 
into mere splinters, and her broken spars; knocking with every 
swell against the base of the wall. The oldest officers of our 
navy, who have been on almost every coast in the world, tell me 
that tliey never saw so magnificent a spectacle in all their sea 
life. The waves no longer rolled, but ran, as if they had no time 
to form high seas: and when they struck the city they sprang as 
if without weight into the air, and threatened to overleap it. One 
of the moles was broken through, and the walls of the city in one 
place demolished, as if the cannon of an enemy had made a 
breach. As I stood on a projecting point, clinging to the low 
parapet, and watched the billow as it drove in, till disappearing 
below, it struck against the base of the wall on which I stood, and 
rose like an arch over my head, drenching me in its passage, I 
had the most vivid conceptions of awful power I ever experienced. 
It was not an angry sea, but a sea run wild, crazy, and dashing 
in reckless energy against the barriers that dared to oppose it. 
The co»tinuous roar heard in every part of the city at midnight, 
w^hen all was asleep save the raving deep was indescribably awful. 
But one vessel appeared on the horizon during the Vviiole time — 
the sea had it all in its own way. This was an English vessel, 
bound from Marseilles to Leghorn, but driven by the gale seventy- 
five miles up the gulf. I watched her as she drew^ near the port, 
driving under bare poles, and hung out her pilot flag. The silent 
request was a vain one, for a boat could not live a moment in 
that sea. On she surged, till near the mouth of the harbour, 
when she was laid to, as the captain feared to attempt the entrance 
in such a tempest, and alone. But he could not carry a rag of 
canvass, and the vessel drove on stern first towards the city. ] 
could fancy the short consultation held on board, whether it were 
best to endeavor to make the port, or hold on outside. It did not 
take long to decide ; tor in a few minutes the noble bark slow ly 
wheeled on the waves, and without a sail up, and with her tall 
masts reeling in the storm, headed straight for the city. An in- 
voluntary cheer burst from my lips, as I saw her roll into port. 
Her bow had almost an intelligent look as it appeared around the 



50 LETTERS FRO^M ITALY. 

end of the mole, fairly in sight of the haven. It was nobly, gal 
lantly done. 

But to the priests. The storm raged for three days, and on 
the fourth, the bishop with the priests went in solemn procession 
to the Cathedral, and took from thence the ashes of John the Bap. 
tist (which they pretend are entombed there), and marched to the 
sea-shore, where, kneeling in presence of the waves, they offered 
up their prayers that heaven would allay the tempest. This was 
in the afternoon ; towards evening the wind shifted to the north, 
and the storm was over. Here was a veritable miracle, and I 
was curious to know how much it had imposed on the people. 
So I began in the morning with Antonio, '■' Well," said I, very 
seriously, "Antonio, there was quite a miracle performed last 
night — we ought to be very thankful tho?t the priests have been 
able to check this storm for us." He shrugged his shoulders, burst 
into a laugh, and said, " Why didn't they pray sooner, before the 
mischief was all done, and not wait three days. Ah, they know 
that storms in this country never last more than four days, and 
they saw the wind was changing before they started." I did not 
expect so plump a confession of humbuggery by a catholic ser- 
vant. My next experiment was with a gentleman of wealth and 
distinction. I made very seriously a similar remark to him. He 
also gave that peculiar Italian shrug which is the most expres 
sive gesture I ever saw, and replied. " Umph, they watched the 
"barometer, and were careful enough not to start till they saw it 
rising." 

This single fact gave me more hope for Italy than anything I 
had witnessed. It showed me that the power of the priest over 
the mind of the people was weakened — that they dared to think. 
W^hen men who have been long under oppression dare to call in 
question and scorn the power they once blindly submitted to, they 
Lave reached a point where change commences. 

Truly, youra. 



LORD BYRON. 51 



LETTER XII. 

Lord Byron — Marquis di Negro. 

Genoa, February. 

Dear E. — To-day, accompanied by Duralde, I have been over 
the palace Lord Byron occupied when he was in Genoa. Here 
were gathered for awhile. Byron, Hunt, Shelley, and the Countess 

of Guiccioli. Count , a Frenchman, has bought the place. 

I had often met him in society, and he showed us with great 
civility the various rooms, together with the improvements he was 
projecting. When Byron first started for Greece, he was driven 
back to Genoa by a storm, and is said to have expressed sad 
forebodings as he again wandered over this, his then solitary 
dwelling. 

The palace stands on a hill, called the grand Paradise, from 
the magnificent view it commands. As I stood in the front cor- 
ridor, and looked off on the varied yet ever glorious prospect, 1 
felt that Byron with his sensative nature must have often becD 
subdued by it, and especially his bold scepticism have stood re- 
buked in presence of the majestic Alps that towered on his vision. 
He wrote the Vision of Judgment here, yet I could not but fancy, 
that, often at evening, when he rose from his unhallowed task, 
and came out to look on this lovely scene, his troubled spirit half 
resolved to abandon its sinful work. The voice of God could 
reach his heart through nature, and tell " him to his face that his 
evil was not good." His Italian teacher has been mine, and I 
often question him of Byron's habits and character. He fully 
confirms the assertion of Hunt, that Byron was a penurious man, 
and capable of great littleness. His generous actions were 
usually done for effect, and if followed out were found to be so 
managed as not to bring personal loss in the end. Shelley, he 
eays, was a nobler man than either Hunt or Byrom. Hunt was 



52 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

cold and repulsive — Byron irritable, and often very unjust, while 
Shelley was generous and ,pen-hearted. He had a copy of the 
" Liberal," which they presented to him, and which I looked over 
witli no ordinary feelings. In visiting Byron in his room, he said 
that he noticed four books always lying on the table. No matter 
what others might have been with them and taken away, these 
four always remained. It struck him they must be peculiar fa- 
vorites of the poet, and so he had the curiosity to examine them, and 
found them to be the Bible, Machiavelli, Shakspeare, and Alfi- 
eri's tragedies. It immediately struck me, that these four vol- 
umes were a perfect illustration of Byron's character. JMachi- 
avelli he loved for his contempt of mankind, making them all a 
flock of sheep, to be led or slaughtered at the will of one haughty 
man. It harmonized with his own undisguised scorn. The 
Bible he read and admired for its lofty poetry, and which Byron 
by the w^ay never scrupled to appropriate. If in his great ode on 
Bonaparte, he had followed Homer as closely as he has Isaiah, 
he would have been accused long ago of downright plagiarism. 
Alfieri he loved for his fiery and tempestuous nature, so much 
like his own. There was also in Alfieri the same haughty scorn 
that entered so largely in Byron's character. He had stormed 
through half of Europe, without deigning to accept a single invi- 
tation into society, treating the proudest nobility of England with 
supreme contempt. He had also the same passion for horses, and 
the same fierce hatred of control. Shakspeare he admired in 
common with every man of feeling or intellect. My teacher told 
me also, that in all his frequent visits to the poet's house, he had 
never seen him walk. How like a spear in the side that club 
foot always was to him. His appearance on horseback, with his 
pale face, long hair, and velvet cap, he said was very striking. 
The Countess Guiccioli seldom appeared in public with him, but 
her brother, Byron's private secretary, usually accompanied him 
in his rides. 

On my return from Byron's mansion, I called on the Marquis 
di Negro. His " Viletta" occupies a hill that overlooks the 
sea, and presents from every point you view it, a most picturesque 
appearance. The hill is walled up on every side, so that it looks 
like an old castle, while the top is converted into a most beautifu^ 



MARQUIS DI NEGRO. 



garden. The Marquis knew Byron well, admired his genius, but 
shook his head when he spoke of his heart. The family of the 
Marquis is one of the oldest and noblest of the city, yet he cares 
nothing for his rank, and prides himself on his literary reputation 
alone. He is republican in his feelings, and has an enthusiastic 
love for America. A father to his tenants, and the unswerving 
friend of the oppressed, his intercessions have released many a 
poor prisoner from a life of confinement. 

Although it is mid-winter, the temperature is soft and mild as 
June ; and as the Marquis flung open the windows to let in the 
air laden with perfume, and the soft breeze from the sea that 
slumbered below, he brought out his harp and told me to give 
him a subject for a song. He has been one of the greatest " Im- 
provisatore" of his time, and still composes with wonderful fa- 
cility. We had been talking of human freedom, and I gave him 
" Liberty." He swept his hand over his harp-strings and sung, 
while he played an accompaniment, one of the sweetest little odes 
I ever heard. He composed both the poetry and music while he 
Bung. 

I loved the Marquis before I had ever seen him. When, a 
stranger in Genoa, I was once wandering over the grounds of his 
viletta, looking at the statuary interspersed among the foliage: 
suddenly my attention was arrested by a marble figure standing 
in a niche, with the inscription over it in large capitals, " ALLA 
MEMORIA DI WASHINGTON "—" TO THE MEMORY 
OF WASHINGTON." I was never taken more by surprise 
in my life. There it stood, the emblem and personification of 
freedom, in one of the most despotic kingdoms of Europe. No 
pride prompted the honor, and self-interest was all against it. 
Feeling, noble feeling alone had placed it there. I never felt a 
compliment to my country, and my country's father, more keenly 
than this statue uttered, standing as it did on the soil of tyranny, 
I sat down at evening and perpetrated the following lines, which 
I afterwards slightly altered, and read to a friend of the Marquis 
who was a frequent visitor at our house. He wished me to send 
Di Negro a copy, and in return the Marquis sent me a collection of 
his entire works, accompanied with some lines in French, whici. 



54 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

I also give, not for the compliment they render me, but for the 
generous sentiments they breathe towards my country. 

TO THE VILLA DI ^'EGSO. 

Sweet Yilla, from the distant sea, 

Long cradled on its stormy breast. 
Thy green top kindly greeted me, 

The first sweet harbinger of rest ; 
And aU tby bowers seemed welcoming 

The weary wanderer from his Lome, 
While, like the gentle breath of spring, 

Thy odois o'er the wares were borne. 

But when, amid thy classic shades, 
I saw npon the sculptured stone. 
What never from a free heart fades, 

" MEilORIA DI WaSHIXGTOX," 

The glad tears came into my eyes, 

And from my lips there breathed a prayer. 
And gazinof still, with sweet surprise, 

I blessed the hand that set it there : 

And suddenly, I seemed again 

Upon my own, free, native hills, 
And heard the shout of myriad men, 

That every patriot bosom thrills, 
« GEORGE WASHIXGTOX, the Great, the Gooor 

But, as I caught its dying fall, 
I turned where that lone statue stood. 

And loved its mute praise more than alL 

God bless thee, noble Marquis ! thou 

Dost bear thy years with vigor yet. 
And not in vain upon thy brow 

Is stamped the look of Lafayette. 
Long may st thou live, the stranger's friend, 

And when thy noble race is run. 
Around thy grave shall come and bend. 

In tears, the sons of Washington- 

Tlie reference to Lafayette in the above lines is owing to the 

fact that the resemblance the Marquis di Negro bears to the 
Marquis Lafayette is so striking, that the likeness of the one is 
often mistaken for that of the other bv those familiar with the 



MARQUIS DI NEGRO. 55 

features of both. He is upwards of seventy years of age, but 
vigorous and active as most men at fifty-five. If you feel in- 
clined to find fault with the French in the lines of the Marquis, 
just remember how difficult it is to write poetry in a foreign lan- 
guage. 

A MONSIEUR HEADLEY.* 

Votre verve se plait d'embellir ma retraite 

Par des accords flatteurs : je vous connais pofete ; 

Mon coeur, reconnaisant k ce trait de bonte, 

Vous oiFre le laurier de rimmortalite. . 

C'est ici que cet arbre a jete ses racines, 

Et a cru par les soins de nos muses latines 

Dans des sieclcs fameux, et lorsque les Romains 

De I'univers entier etaient les souverains: 

Les temps sont bien changes? mais chfere est la memoir© 

De ces hdros brillant dans le sein de I'histoire ; 

Mon esprit se reveilla k ce beau souvenir, 

Qui ne pourra jamais dans mon aime perir. 

Honorer le talent fut toujours ma devise, 

Libre dans mes dlans ma voix n'est pas soumise 

A I'envie, aux dedains, aux prejug^s du jour, 

i^a v6nt6 m'eclaire, excitant mon amour ; 

* 'JrtvA^SLATiox. — Your genius is pleased to embellish my retreat by its flat- 
tering nuiuDers. I recognize you a poet, and offer you the laurel of immortality 
Here this tree first cast its roots and grew under the fostering care of our Latin 
muses in trie jrlorious ages, and when the Romans were the monarchs of the 
world, 'i'ne times are indeed changed ; but the memory of those heroes is still 
dear, and my spirit awakes at tbe pleasant remembrance, which shall never 
perish from my soul. My motto always has been to honor talent ; and, free 
in my feelings, my voice never submits to envy, scorn, or the prejudices of the 
day. It is truth, and truth only, that illiuxkines my spirit, and excites my af- 
fection. America is dear to me, and I adore the name of the immortal Wash- 
ington, — the conqueror by his arm, and the father by his laws. Who can 
keep silence in the presence of his gloiy? He refused the honor of sover- 
eignty to give peace and liberty to his country. In this garden you see his 
*tatue sculptured, — for a long time the only monument of him in Europe. My 
4)irit partaltes with yovurs its raptures. Apollo smiles on me, his rays inflame 
me, and despite my old age I am able, by my strains, to praise your country 
in the face of the universe. 

John Charles di Negro. 

The Villa, January 24, 1843. 



56 LETTERS FROM ITALY 

L'Amerique nrest 3here. et dans remotion 

J'auore avec respet rimmortal Washtngton. 

Et quel etre pouvrait t sa gloire se taire. 

Lui par son bras vanqueur. et par ses lois le pere. 

Qui refusa rhonneur de souverainte 

En donnant genereux la pai:x, la liberte. 

Dans cet Eden fleuri vous voyez son image 

Dre^ee, et des long-temps, par im tribut d'hommago. 

En Europe le seul venere monument, 

Qui recoit de tous iieux et les voeux et I'accent. 

Je partage arec vous ce mouvement de Tame ; 

Apollon me sourit et son ray en m'eufl.amme, 

Et malgre mes vieux ans je puis par mes concerts 

Louer yotre patrie en face ^ Timivers, 

GiA-V Carlo di Negro 
Delia Villetta, ce 24 Janvier, 1S43. 

Our naval officers in the Mediterranean will haTS cause ong 
to remember him with gratitude. 

Truly ycHirs. 



SOLDIERS AT MASS. %^ 



LETTER XIII. 

Soldiers at Mass — Casino— Magdalen — Italian Virtue. 

Genoa, February, 1843. 
Dear E. — I have noticed several mornings, quite a large por- 
tion of the army march at nine o'clock past our house to the 
sound of music, and in about an hour after return. It has puz- 
zled me much to know what could occupy them so short a time 
every day at so early an hour — so this morning I followed after, 
when going down to the end of Strada Balbi, I saw them wheel 
and ascend the steps of the San Lorenzo church. It was all 
plain in a moment — the soldiers were attending Mass. I entered 
behind them, and have seldom witnessed a more impressive spec- 
tacle. The better companies marched up each side of the nave, 
and stood with their faces all turned towards the main altar. 
The two ranks formed two lines, reaching from the door up to the 
transept. At the word of command they wheeled as one man, 
face to face, while the officers slowly walked up between them to 
the farther end, when they wheeled back facing the altar. All 
was decorous and solemn as a New England church of a Sabbath 
morning, and those soldiers stood with caps on and muskets to 
their breasts, under those noble arches and amid those marble 
columns, as motionless as the marble itself, while a forest of steel 
glittered above their heads. Suddenly a little bell tinkled in 
the distance, and a priest entered. It tinkled again, and he ad- 
vanced to the altar. The third time it broke the stillness a low 
order passed up the ranks, when a thousand muskets came to the 
marble pavement with a clang that made my heart for a moment 
stop its beating. In a moment it was still again, and the long 
ranks bowed their heads upon their hands, while a low prayer 
ftrose on the stillness. It ceased, and suddenly from under my 
very feet, twenty drums broke in, and beat a wild and hurried 



58 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

strain so loud and startling, that every stroke seemed to hit my 
brain. Again it was still, and the voice of prayer alone swelled 
through the temple. The appearance of that motionless army, 
the great contrast between the solemnity and silence of divine 
worship, and the noise of ringing steel and sound of martial 
music, combined to render the w^hole scene a succession of the 
most lively yet conflicting emotions. 

Night before last I was at the Marquis di Negro's ; indeed, 
his " Conversazioni " are the only parties I frequent with any 
pleasure. There is an absence of all formality in them, and the 
old Marquis himself is so determined to make every one about 
him happy, that he cannot but succeed. I mention that night, 
merely because I was driven into convulsions of laughter by an 

apology which the Marchioness of B made for a misfortune 

that happened to some of her friends the day before. Several 
of the nobility had been invited on board one of our ships of the 
line to dinner. After the ladies had left the table, the wine began 
to circulate pretty freely, and frequent toasts were drunk. The 
Italians thought it would be the height of incivility not to drain 
their glass at every toast, and, unaccustomed to our strong wines, 
soon became tipsy, and hence behaved as tipplers generally do 
under such circumstances. The ladies, of course, were very 

much shocked and mortified. The Marchioness of B came 

to me to explain the matter. She said the gentlemen felt they 
must, in courtesy, drink the toasts, or, as she expressed it, "per 
forzaj''' and the wine was so strong that they were caught before 
they were aware of it. One of her friends, she said, had been in 
England, and knew the effect of our wine ; and so when he put 
the glass to his mouth, let it run down his vest, for he must (" per 
forza ") pretend to drink. Here she put on such a dolorous look, 
and passed her hands down her dress to show the way in which 
the wine flowed into the poor fellow's bosom with such inimitable 
naivete, that I burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter. Give 
me your Italian women to smoothe over a difficulty. 

Last night was the last grand display of the Casino, and I was 
never more mortified than when the Marquis di Negro, who is 
the President of it, came to me and said, " I see none of your 
officers are here, I am told they feel tliemselves neglected in 



CASINO, ETIQUETTE, ETC. 59 

the mode of sending out the invitations. I have been to the Con- 
sul and to the Commodore, and requested them to invite them all. 
I heard they refused to come before from the same reason, and 
hence have done everything in my power to secure the pleasure 
of their company, and regret exceedingly not to see them present." 
I had nothing to say, but hung my head in mortification. It was 
true that some of the officers deemed themselves not sufficiently 
recognized in the invitation, and hence the whole banded together, 
thus publicly to resent the affi-ont. If it had been any one else 
but Di Negro, I would have minded it less ; but to wound him, 
who had never ceased lavishing his kindest attentions on our 
Navy since it had been in port, seemed ungenerous. 

A great deal of this silly adherence to rigid etiquette has been 
exhibited by many of our officers, much to their own discredit. 
The Consul has done everything in his power, and has been un- 
wearied in his exertions to render the stay of the officers agreea- 
ble. The Governor has given him a carte hianche for all his 
balls. Conversazioni, soirees, &c., which he fills up with the 
name of every American gentleman who enters the city, and 
wishes to mingle in its society. Great courtesy is also extended 
towards the captains of our merchantmen, and we venture to 
say, they never entered a port where they received so much at- 
tention from a public officer, as from him. We w^ish some of our 
consuls farther south had more of his urbanity, and willingness, 
nay, anxiety, to render every service to Americans. We wish, 
also, that Government would honor the office with a salary, that 
it may be better able to honor the Government in return. There 
is no accounting for the meanness of our Government in its treat- 
ment of our Consuls, except by saying it has become such a habit 
it is overlooked. The money thrown away yearly, in sending 
out ministers to be recalled in three months, would support thirty 
consuls where they are needed, but cannot now live except on 
their own incomes. 

Among the literary men I have met, none have pleased me 
more than Prof. Botta, Professor in the Genoa University, and a 
relative of the historian Botta. News has reached us that Silvio 
Pellico is dead. I regret his death the more, as I had a letter oi 



60 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

introduction to him, and hoped to have seen the patriot before I 
left the country.* 

Two things you wish to hear about before I leave Genoa — its 
aits and morals. There is but little statuary here, and although 
there are many valuable paintings in the private palaces, they 
are so overshadowed by those of Florence and Rome that they 
do not attract the attention they deserve. In the Durazzo palace 
is a Magdalen that has but one equal in the world, and that is 
precisely like it, and is in Venice. Its beauty consists in its nat- 
uralness. It is not a beautiful woman in despair, dressed or un- 
dressed, as the CcLse may be, for effect, but one simply in grief, 
and whose beauty the artist has taken no pains to conceal, is 
marred by the excess of her wo. Her eyes are swollen with 
weeping, and turned to heaven with that beseeching look in which 
faith is always mingled — indeed, her whole face is a prayer. The 
storm of passion is past — she has sobbed her grief away, and 
exhausted and penitent, is leaning on the arm of Infinite kindness. 
In the noble face is blended penitence, with the shame forgotten 
in her strong love ; sorrow without despair, and faith VN'ithout 
boldness. 

The architecture of Genoa might be studied by artists to ad- 
vantage. It has not the meretriciousness of that farther south, 
but combines simplicity, beauty, and strength. 

I wish I could speak favorably of the morals of the city. The 
middling classes, composed of merchants, lawyers, physicians, 
&c., are more virtuous ttian the nobility. Among the latter, 
chastity is not regarded as of any particular consequence. The 
custom of cavaliere servanie originated here. What would you 
think to see one of the highest officers in the army mingling in 
the highest circles of the kingdom, while living in open nicest, or 
of a lady of the highest title of nobility, whirling in the most 
fashionable saloons, whose character is no better than that of a 
femme de pave ? Last night at the Casino, my friend introduced 
a tall ofiicer to an American lady by his request. He was minus 
an eye, and she, thinking it was lost in battle, looked in admira- 
tion on the honorable scar. Alas, it was struck out by the dag- 
ger of an indignant husband in his own house. An Italian woman 

* We afterv.ards heard that the report was imtrue. 



ITALIAN VIRTUE. 61 



of rank, without her lover, deems herself unfortunate indeed. 
Italians love, and love wildly, but they want new objects. No- 
thing but the intensity of a fresh passion can satisfy them — yet it 
is no affectation with them — it flames up in the heart with a fierce- 
ness unknown in our cold climate. 

A descendant of Prince Doria is now in the city, though sel- 
dom seen out of his palace. Engaged to a lady of high rank in 
Rome, he went on a short visit to Paris, where he fell in love 
with a French woman, and entered into a contract of marriage 
also with her. His betrothed in Rome hearing of it abandoned 
herself to despair, and pined rapidly away. The news of her 
sickness and approaching death reaching young Doria at Paris, 
brought back all his old affection, and he hastened to Rome, but, 
alas ! to hear, that only the day before his arrival, she was laid 
in the grave, that receptacle for broken and weary hearts. Sev- 
eral young nobles, friends of her and her family, bound them- 
selves by an oath never to rest till they had slain Doria. He 
made his escape by night, and is now at Genoa in perpetual fear 
of liis life. His first love is in her grave — his second has cast 
him off in scorn, and the wreck that both have left him, he has 
time now to muse upon. There are two worlds we live in, my 
dear cousin, and there are wilder battlefields than Waterloo in 
one of them ; and fiercer storms than shake navies to pieces, and 
more terrific volcanoes than outward ones — battlefields of the 
heart — ^tempests of feeling, and volcanoes of passion. And there 
are victories, whose ruin is greater than defeat — victories won 
over blasted affection, by renouncing love and confidence for ever. 
Thus we live — our heads above water, and our hearts under it. 
All the splutter and motion' is on the surface, but the deep dark 
tides and boiling eddies are beneath. 

Truly yours. 



62 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XIV. 

The Scenes of the Carnival — Cheathig the Church — Blind Man, &lc. 

Genoa, 1843. 

Dear E. — The Carnival is over, and the long holiday of the 
Kingdom is closed. The streets look silent and lonely ; for the 
gay placards, announcing a festive scene for the night, and which 
seemed to give elasticity and life to the passer-by, are seen no 
more. The Opera-FIouse looks silent and deserted, and all the 
people feel the effect of this sudden suspension of their festivities. 
The church bells have a solemn tone ; — ^the carriages do not 
move so briskly through the streets, and the shops no longer hang 
out their flashy costumes to entice the gay masker or dancer of 
the coming evening. You cannot conceive the effect of this 
sudden change from the excess of every pleasure to none at all. 
The festivities of the Carnival go on increasing to its close, even 
to the very last hour : and when the great bell of the Cathedral 
strikes the hour of twelve, sending its slow and solemn peal over 
the city, the dissipation of the people is at its highest pitch. The 
city fairly reels under the boisterous mirth of that last hour of 
Carnival : — knowing that forty days Lent is before them, they 
crowd the flying minutes to overflowing with pleasures. But 
when the hammer of that deep-toned bell announces that the last 
hour and the last minute have expired, all is changed, and the 
rnasker and the dancer throw aside their follies, and repair to the 
Churches to offer up their prayers and confessions. 

They have one curious custom, however, at the Theatre on the 
last night. The Pit is cleared of its seats, and forms with the 
stage one grand hall. The whole is brilliantly illuminated and 
filled with maskers and dancers. The law is, that no dance shall 
be commenced after the great bell of the Cathedral has struck the 
hour of midnight. They are not required, however, to stop in 
the middle of one already begun, but are permitted to dance 



CHEATING THE CHURCH. 63 

it out. Taking advantage of this law, just before midnight, they 
divide the Orchestra and form a new dance. One part of the 
Orchestra rest till the other become fatigued, when they relieve 
them. There are always enough dancers to keep the set full, 
and yet half the company be resting. In this way the dance is 
not ended till two o'clock. By this simple process they cheat the 
Church out of two good hours. 

As I remarked, the last night is the gayest of all : and so ia 
the last day, with the exception, perhaps, of the last Sabbath. 
On these two days they mask in the streets. It was an odd spec- 
tacle to see the entire length of the main artery of the city lit- 
erally packed with human heads, most of them not attempting to 
move forward, but standing still to see the carriages and gro- 
tesque figures pass and repass. The carriages would come to- 
gether in a long train, the horses on a slow walk to escape tram- 
pling the multitude under foot, carrying men, women and chil- 
dren, tricked out in every costume the fancy could invent. It 
was impossible to distinguish between footmen, drivers, and their 
lords. Now would pass a rich carriage with its coat of arms, 
and filled with men and women of the thirteenth century, and 
behind it, four painted and grotesque figures on four ponies read- 
ing aloud a magnificent will, bequeathing any amount of property 
to whoever could get it. Now would pass a buffoon on foot, 
with an immense wooden paddle, with a hole in it six inches 
across for a quizzing glass. Next on donkeys three persons whom 
I took from the cut of their boots which dangled below their 
dress, to be American officers. One was in the costume of a 
woman, with a bonnet on, a rich lace shawl over her shoulders, 
and a white satin dress, which, as she rode astride, was pulled back 
over the tail of the donkey and descended nearly to the ground. 
The large, rich flounce dangled around his fet-locks, and drew 
peals of laughter from the spectators. Noses as long as your 
arm and steeple hats like sugar loaves would project from some 
elegant carriage. An old woman would meet you carrying a doll 
baby, and weeping piteously over its misfortunes. As the long- 
train of carriages approached, the crowd, that literally crammed 
the entire street, would slowly part, like waves before a moving 
vessel, and when it had passed, like those waves would again close 



U LETTERS FKOM ITALY. 



in behind. In the villages out of the city every public square 
was filled with gay dancers, bounding merrily under the light of 
a pleasant sun and an Italian heaven. 

But amid all the shifting and fantastic characters that moved 
and sported around me, there was one plain unmasked figure that 
interested me more than all. It was an old blind man that I had 
often seen in the streets when the sun was pleasant and the air 
was mild, led by a little child. To-day he was alone. At first 
I thought I was mistaken. It could not be he — thus left alone amid 
the jostling multitude. But there was the same woollen cap over 
the grey hairs — ^the same old rusty surtout coat — the same sight- 
less eyeballs. He had selected a part of the street less thronged 
than the rest, and was feeling his way through Strada Balbi — one 
hand slowly passing along the walls of the palaces, and the other 
tremulously grasping a stout cane. But why was he there alone 
so sad and mournful ? He could see nothing of this aboundinor 
gaiety, and his countenance wore none of the mirth that made the 
street ring around him. ' No one watched him — no one seemed to 
care for him. He seemed a walking reproof to the high-blooded 
and careless youth that shouted by. As I watched him hugging 
the wall, that he might not be caught away, and borne off by the 
living stream, and with slow and unsteady steps threading his way 
under the shadow of these mighty palaces, I immediately divined 
the whole. He could not find it in his heart to tie the child, that 
usually piloted him in his wanderings, to his side amid such re- 
joicings. All had gone off, leaving the old man behind, as unfit 
to be taken among the crowd. In his solitude he had sat, and 
heard the murmur and shouts without his dwelling, reminding him 
of his boyish days, till he could sit quiet no longer. Alone, unaid- 
ed, he had groped his way into the streets. The tread of hasty feet, 
the mirth and the laughter, quickened the blood in his old veins, 
and the scenes of his boyhood came back on his faduig memory. 
Half sad, half glad and half fearful, he thus passed along, 
probably for the last time, the streets of his native city on the 
last day of Carnival. So I have seen an old blind man in my 
own country, sitting in the mild air of a summer evening, leaning 
on the top of his cane, and listening with a sad smile to the laughter 
and mirth of ooys at play on the village green. Truly yours. 



CIVITA VECCHIA. 



LETTER XV. 



Leghorn — Civita Vecchia — Naples. 

CiviTA Vecchia, March, 1843L 

Dear E. — I see you staring at the date of this letter, and 
wondering what I have to do in " Civita Vecchia" (old city) — • 
why just nothing at all, only calculating how long it will take 
me to get out of it. I have been in my share of villainous towns, 
but this has a combination of qualities in this respect, that defies 
all comparisons. The suburbs are barren as a desert, and the 
inurhs dirty as a choked up sewer. The people look like cut- 
throats that have starved at their business, and the inside of the 
churches, like the refuse of the almshouse. I walked over it 
with an English lady — an acquaintance of Dickens by the way — 
who tells me that Dickens is getting out a work, reflecting on us 
in a manner that -will throw his " Notes on America" entirely in 
the shade. She says she supposed our rapturous reception of 
him was occasioned by the fear we had of his pen. Shade of 
Hector defend us ! this is too much. However, we deserve it, or 
rather those of my countrymen deserve it, who out-did Lilliput in 
their admiration of the modern Gulliver ; for I plead not guilty to 
the charge of " fool" in that sublimest of all follies ever perpe- 
trated by an intelligent people. I will cry " bravo " to every 
pasquinade Dickens lets off on that demented class, who cried 
out every time they saw that buffalo-skin over-coat appear, " The 
Gods have come down to us." 

Do you ask how T got here ? by steam ! They charge on the 
Mediterranean steamboats, at the rate of ten dollars for the dis- 
tance between New York and Albany. Their mode of running, 
or rather their habit of stopping, is very convenient for travellers. 
We started in the evening from Genoa, and waked up in the 
morning in Leghorn. We remained in port all day, allowing 



66 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

the passengers time to visit Pisa and return. The English 
Cemetery at Leghorn is very beautiful. I walked through it to 
find the tomb of SmoUet, and while in quest of it met an English 
lady in search of the same thing ; who civilly asked me if I could 
point it out to her. I returned with her to the tomb, and while 
there, remarked to the friend with whom I was in company, that 
he had better pluck a flower, to carry back as a memento to 
America. " What," said the lady to me, " are you an Ameri- 
can ?" I replied that I was. " And from what part of the United 
States ?" " From New York." She then asked me if I knew a 
painter by the name of Coates. I told her I did not, but I be- 
lieved I had seen his name in the catalogue of those who had 
paintings in the Academy of Design. She said he was an Eng- 
lishman by birth, and had removed to New York and married an 
American lady. About the time the President was lost, he was 
expected in England, on his way to Italy. Since then he had 
never been heard of. Much anxiety had been felt on his account, 
and it was feared he had gone down in the ill-fated vessel. I 
replied, I supposed it was a very easy matter to determine that, 
by consulting the list of those who embarked in her. " Well," 
said she, " if you ever see him in New York, tell him you met 
his mother at Smollet's tomb," and burst into tears, and turned 
away. She gave me no opportunity of making farther inquiries, 
and I saw her no more. It struck me as exceedingly singular, 
that she should be his mother, and yet not know whether he sunk 
in the President or not, and still more singular that she should 
expect I would see him before she would even know whether he 
was dead or alive. He must be a singular son, or " thereby 
hangs a tale," that the mother might unfold. 

The wind blew like a hurricane from shore, as we came down 
the coast last night, but the sea kept smooth except when we were 
passing from point to poLit, across some large bay. The steamer 
was a snug sea-boat, and walked with almost noiseless step 
among the many islands that surrounded her. It was nearly mid- 
night when we passed Elba, and I cannot describe to you the feel- 
ings with which I gazed on that island, casting its great, silent 
shadow over the sea. Bonaparte has left his image on every 
point of land he has touched ; but one's reflections of him always 



NAPLES. 67 



end painfully, and the mind runs down from Emperor, liero, war- 
rior, to robber, where it stops. Strange, but the keen repartee 
said to have been inflicted on him once by an Italian lady, came 
to me as I looked on the Island. Said Napoleon once in company, 
speaking of the thieving propensities of the Italians, " tutti gli 
Italiani sono i ladroni," (all the Italians are robbers). " Non 
tutti," replied the lady, " ma bona-partef" not all, but the greater 
part, or, Bonaparte. This is almost too good to be true. 

I forgot to mention one thing of Civita Vecchia, and which I 
here record to the honor of the only decent man in it. The 
Englishwoman and myself were walking around the town, and 
finally, as promising some relief, stepped to the walls of the city 
for the purpose of looking off upon the sea ; but at every attempt 
we were repulsed by a soldier, who said it was forbidden. The 
silliness of the command, just as if it were possible that any liv- 
ing man could be such an unmitigated fool as to wish to recon- 
noitre the walls for the purpose of ascertaining their weakness, so 
as one of these days to scale them, made me resolve to resist it. 
So stepping up to a soldier, who had just driven us back, I said 
in my blandest tone, " Why, you cannot be so ungallant as to re- 
fuse to permit a lady to look over the walls just for one moment.^' 
He looked around to see if any one was watching, and replied, 
" Well, for one moment, I don't care, but only one moment." I 
had conquered, so sfepping up, we looked over, and lo, we saw — . 
nothing. I thanked the fellow for his civility, and if I had any 
influence with his Holiness, he should be immediately promoted. 



It was a beautiful evening when we wheeled out of the con- 
temptible little port of Civita Vecchia, and sped off for Naples. 
The wind had lulled, and the sea rolled with a gentle swell as 
our gallant little steamer shot along the Italian coast. Just at 
sunset we came opposite the Tiber, where it empties into the sea 
at Ostia, the ancient port of Rome. The dome of St. Peter's 
frowned grey in the distance, backed by snow peaks, and I began 
to feel the influence of the "eternal city" upon me. Around 
that port had clustered the Roman galleys, laden with the spoils 
of successful war— on their way to Caesar's palace. What a 



68 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

change the centuries had wrought! I cculd not but picture to 
myself how Csesar would have looked, if when lying off this port 
with his fleet, he had seen a steamer, breathing fire and smoke 
from her decks, and without sail, driving right down against wind 
and sea upon him. Methinks he would have told his helmsman, 
notwithstanding he " bore the great Csesar," he had better haul 
a little closer in shore ; and all the galleys would have huddled 
like frightened swans into Ostia. Really Caesar's galley did look 
small beside our steamer. All this time my friend stood leaning 
over the rail, and gazing off on the shore, looking as if memory 
was busy with the mighty past. But just when I was expecting 
some extremely poetical sentiment, he drily remarked, without 
looking up, as he knocked the ashes from his cigar, " I wonder 
if Cassius ever did swim across that river with Csesar on his 
back." 

At length the full round moon rose over the scene, turning the 
sea into a floor of diamonds, over which our vessel went curtsey- 
ing, as if herself half conscious of the part she was acting in front 
of old Rome. All seemed to feel the inspiration of the hour, and 
were scattered around on the moonlit deck in silent musing. It 
was an hour when home and its memories visit the spirit, and the 
heart travels back over the long interval to its place of repose. 
A Russian baroness and her niece, a sweet Finlandese, who were 
leaning over the side of the ship, humming fragments of melodies, 
at length burst into a native song, sending their rich voices far 
over the moonlit sea. A handsome Greek stood by with his dark 
eye and solemn face, drinking in the poetry of the scene and the 
music of the strain, till, unable longer to contain his feelings, he 
bowed his head on the bulwarks and covered his face with his 
hands. A French Count sat on the quarter-deck kicking his 
heels against the cabin, humming snatches from some opera by 
way of accompaniment to the song. He seemed quite uncon- 
scious of the discords he was making, while the Finlandese would 
ever and anon turn her blue eye inquiringly towards him, as if 
she would ask what he were trying to do, till she could contam 
herself no longer, and burst into a clear laugh, that rang almost 
as musical as her song. This broke up the poetry of the scene, 
and we subsided away into a good-natured chit-chat, until one 



NAPLES. 



after another dropped off into the cabin, and my friend and my- 
self were left alone with the moon and the night. That glorious 
moolight sail along the coast of Italy has left its bright impression 
on my heart for ever. 

As I rose in the morning and went on deck, the first object that 
arrested my attention was the top of Vesuvius, which I caught 
through a notch in the mountain, sending up its dark column of 
smoke in the morning air. Islands came and passed us, till at 
length, rounding a point of land, the far-famed Bay of Naples 
opened before us. I cannot say the entrance struck me as pecu- 
liarly beautiful — the approach to Genoa is far more impressive. 
There is no striking back-ground of hills; and with the exception 
of St. Elmo, there is nothing on which the eye rests with peculiar 
interest. The beauty of the bay is seen in riding round it. In 
this aspect it is unequalled, for wherever you go there bends that 
same beautiful curve, sprinkled with villages, while Capri and 
Ischia sleep quietly out at sea. Take away the associations of 
both, and I think a stranger would be more impressed with the 
entrance to New York harbor, than with the entrance to the Bay 
of Naples. Association is everything. Clothe the shore with 
buried cities, and spread an air of romance over every hill-top, 
and it is wonderful how different rugged nature will look. On 
the other hand, let all the associations be those of commerce, and 
the most beautiful scenery will have a very matter-of-fact appear- 
ance. There is a dreamy haze over everything around Naples 
that gives its scenery a soft and subdued aspect ; added to this, 
there is a dreamy haze also over the spirit, so that it is quite im- 
I iissible to see ordinary defects. But don't misunderstand me — 
the bay of Naples viewed from shore is the most beautiful bay I 
have ever seen, but, approached from the sea, inferior to that of 
New York. Set Vesuvius in motion, and pour its lava in, fire- 
torrents down the breast of the mountain, lighting up the shore 
and sea, and painting in lines of blood on the water each approach- 
ing vessel ; and make a canopy of cinders and sparks boine hither 
and thither by the night wind, while the steady working of the 
fierce volcanic engine is like the sound of he^^y thunder — and I 
grant you that the approach to Naples would be unrivalled. 

Truly ^ours. 



TO LETTERS FROM ITALY 



LETTER XVI. . 

Visit to Pompeii — Ruins — Character of the People. 

Naples, March, 1843. 
Deae E. — The Neapolitan maxim, " Vedi Napoli e poi mori," 
— '' See Naples and then die," — is not so egotistical. The man 
who dies without seeing it, that is, in one of its most favorable 
aspects, loses no ordinary pleasure. There is a combination of 
scenery here to be found nowhere else, though particular portions 
of it may be seen in every country. But here is a beautiful bay, 
islands, cities, villages, palaces, vineyards, plams, mountains, and 
volcanoes, gathered into one " coup-d'ceiL'^ There is the grandeur 
of the past, and the beauty of the present ; ruined temples, and per- 
fect ones ; living cities, and buried ones ; and over them all a sky 
that would make any country lovely, however rugged. Day before 
yesterday I rode out to Pompeii. At 8 o'clock I landed from the 
steam-boat — at 101 was on my way with an English gentleman and 
lady for the city of the dead. It lies twelve miles distant, and in the 
clear air and new objects that surrounded me, I forgot the object 
that had hurried me away. Now an old-looking vehicle would pass 
us, whose shape could hardly be made out, from the number of 
ragged, dirty beings that covered it — standing, sitting, lying, and 
indeed piled up in every direction, so as to occupy the least possible 
space. I counted on several of these two-wheeled, one-horsed 
vehicles, ten persons. There would sit a row of miserable-look- 
ing women outside of their houses, all engaged in the same occu- 
pation — looking heads. Here a little urchin would be sitting on 
the ground, with his head between the knees of a woman who 
was busy with his head, while behind her stood a third perform- 
ing the same kind service, and all forming a group both ludi- 
crous and revolting. In another direction would stand a man in 
the streets with a plate in one hand, while from the other lifted 



POMPE/L 71 



over his head, which was thrown back to a horizontal position, 
hung in tempting profusion long strings of maccaroni, that dis- 
appeared down his neck like young snakes in the throat of their 
mother. Thus we passed along through Torre del Greco, and 
the ancient Oplonti, and then emerged into the open country, 
where the piled-up lava and barren hill-sides reminded us that 
we were approaching a scene of volcanic fury. Yet here and 
there were green patches from which the balmy bean sent forth 
its fragrance, contrasting strangely with the lava walls that en- 
closed them. 

We at length reached the gate of the ancient city, where we 
left our carriage, and commenced the strangest city promenade I 
ever made. I had always supposed that Pompeii was like Her- 
culaneum, and that one must descend to enter it. But the buried 
city forms a hill, and is excavated from a level, so that j^ou en- 
ter it as you would any other town. We first entered the house 
of Diomed, one of the aristocrats of the city. We descended into 
the damp, dark wine cellar, where the bones of his family were 
found, whither they had fled for safety from the storm of ashes 
and fire that overwhelmed them. There, against the side of the 
v/all, amid the earthen wine-jars that still stood as they did on the 
last day of that wild tempest, was the shape of the outstretched 
arms and the breast and head of her who had fallen against it in 
her death-agony. Nothing remained but the bones and jewels, 
to tell the sad story of her torture and suffocation in that 
dread hour. But I cannot go into details. They have been 
written over a hundred times. There were baths, and dressing 
and dining rooms, and work-shops, and wheel-worn streets, where 
the living multitude had moved, and luxuriated, and toiled. We 
saw tombs that were themselves entombed ; rooms for washing 
the dead, where the living were suddenly buried unwashed and 
uncoffined ; beer-shops, with the marks of the tumblers still fresh in 
the smooth marble — and the mill-stones that still turned to the hand 
in the self-same way they turned nearly two thousand years ago. 
There too were the brothel, and theatre, and dancing-hall. The se- 
cret orifice through which the priest sent his voice to the statue, to 
delude the people into the belief the god had spoken, was now dis- 
closed. I walked through the house of a poet, into his garnished 



72 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

sleeping apartments, forming, in their silence, a part in a greater 
drama than he had ever conceived. I stood before the tavern 
with the rings yet entire to which the horses were fastened, and 
where the bones of a mother and her three children were found 
locked in each other's arms. Temples were overthrown with 
their altars, and the niches in which stood the gods were now left 
empty, and the altars before them, on which smoked the sacrijce, 
silent and lonely. Columns fallen across each other in the courts 
just as that wild hurricane had left them, pieces of the architrave 
blocking up the entrances they had surmounted, told how fierce 
the shock and overthrow had been. One house was evidently that of 
a remarkably rich man. Mosaic floors representing battle scenes, 
precious stones still embedded in the pavements of his corridors, 
long colonnades, and all the appurtenances of luxury, attested the 
unbounded wealth of the owner. But no bodies were found in 
it. The rich man had fled with his portable wealth before the 
storm came. We passed through the temple of Jupiter, the court 
of Justice, the Forum, the market-place, and finally emerged into 
the country. 

I mounted an old wall, covered with earth, and looked back on 
the disentombed city, and beyond on Vesuvius. There it stood, sol- 
emn, grand, and lonely, sending up its steady column of smoke, a 
perpetual and living tombstone over the dead at its feet. I could 
see the track of the lava on its wild and fiery march for the sea, 
and imagine just how the cloud of ashes and cinders rose from 
the summit and came flying toward the terror-stricken city. Foot 
after foot it piled itself in the streets, over the thresholds, above 
the windows, and so on till it reached twenty or thirty feet above 
the tops of the houses. There was the sea where the eager 
Pliny came, and, impelled by a fatal curiosity, would land, till, 
blinded and suffocated, he too fell with the victims that perished. 

From this we went to the amphitheatre, where the gladiatorial 
shows were held. It is a magnificent area of an oval form, and 
sufficiently capacious to hold fifteen or twenty thousand specta- 
tors. The dens w-here the lions were kept still stood, and tliere 
-was the very area in which men fought and fell. I stood at one 
end and shouted, and the answering echo came back clear and 
distinct as a second voice. It enhanced the solitude. Some have 



POMPEII. 73 



imdgii>rit3 ihat spectators were assembled here at the time of the 
overthrow of the city, and as they felt the first step of the mighty 
earthquake that heralded its doom, rushed in dismay from their 
seats. But this could not be, for Pompeii did not fall by an earth- 
quake; and the mountain, long before the eruption, gave terribly 
distinct omens of the coming blow. Dio relates that spectres lined 
the summit of the mountain, and unearthly shapes flitted around 
its trembling sides. This was doubtless the mist boiling up from 
its confinement through the crevices, and shooting into the upper 
air. Pliny himself says in his epistle that he saw from Misenus, 
fifteen or twenty miles distant from Naples on the other side, a 
cloud rising from the mountain in the shape of a pine tree, and 
shortly after embarked for the city. The groaning mountain 
was reeling above the sea of fire that boiled under her, and strug- 
gled for freedom. It was not a time for amusement. Terrified 
men and women ran for the sea ; that also fled back affi'ighted 
from its shores, so that even Pliny could not land before the city, 
but was forced to proceed to Stabise. The bellowing mountain, 
the sulphureous air, the quivering earth, would not let a city even 
so dissolute as Pompeii gather to places of public amusements 
Consternation reigned in every street, and drove the frightened 
inhabitants away from their dwellings. This is doubtless the 
reason why so few bodies were found. Those that perished were 
slaves, or those who tarried till some falling column or wall 
blocked up their path, and the descending cinders blinded their 
sight as they groped about for a way of egress. Fear and dark- 
ness (for day was turned into night) might have enthralled others 
beyond the power of moving. And I was standing on the same 
pavement those terror-stricken citizens stood on two thousand 
years ago, and was looking on the same mountain they gazed on 
with such earnest inquiry and fearful forebodings. Then it rock- 
ed and swayed and thundered above the pent-up forces that 
threatened to send it in fragments through the heavens. Now, 
silent and quiet, it stood firm on its base. Yet to me it had a 
morose and revengeful look, as if it were conscious of the ruin at 
its feet, 

The excavations are more extensive than I supposed, and tne 
effect of the clear light of the sun and the open sky on the deserted 



LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



pavements is peculiar and solemn. A visit to it is an episode Id 
a man's life that he can never forget. An old column or a bro- 
ken wall of a once populous city interests us. We stand and 
muse over the ruined pile till it becomes eloquent with the history 
of the past. If one single complete tem.ple be found, how it in- 
creases the interest. But to wander through a whole city stand- 
ing as its inhabitants left it in their sudden fear, adds tenfold to the 
vividness of the picture. The little household things meeting you 
at every turn, give speciality to the whole. As I strolled from 
apartment to apartment, I almost expected to meet some one 
within the door. 'I felt like an intruder as I passed into the sleep- 
ing rooms of others — as if I were entering the private apartments 
of those who were merely absent on a ride or a visit. The 
scenes were familiar, and it appeared but a short time since the 
eyes of those who occupied the dwellings rested on the same ob- 
jects. In turning the corners of the streets, it would hardly have 
surprised me to have met the inhabitants just returning, and look- 
ing on me as a stranger and an intruder. It required an effort 
to convince myself that these streets and these dwellings were 
thronged and occupied for the last time nearly two thousand years 
ago. I assure you the struggle was not to call up the past, but 
to shake it off— and when I finally stood at the gate and gave a 
farewell look to the lonely city that faintly shone in the light of 
the setting sun, a feeling of indescribable sadness stole over me, 
and I rode away without the wish ever to see it again. 

But the view of the bay, and the careless laughing groups we 
met at every step, soon restored our spirits. The streets were 
filled with loungers, all expressing in their manners and looks the 
Neapolitan maxim, " dolce far niente" (it is sweet to do nothing). 
You have heard of the bright eyes and raven tresses and music- 
like language of the Neapolitans ; but I can assure you there is 
nothing like it here, i. e. among the lower classes. The only dif- 
ference that I can detect between them and our Indians is, that 
our wild bloods are the more beautiful of the two. The color is 
the same, the hair very like indeed, and as to the " soft bastard 
Latin" they speak, it is one of the most abominable dialects I 
ever heard. I know this is rather shocking to one's ideas of 
Italian women. I am sure I was prepared to view them in a 



CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE. 7t 

fa-v orable, nay, in a poetical light ; but amid all the charms and 
excitements of this romantic land, I cannot see otherwise. The 
old women are hags, and the young women dirty, slip-shod slat- 
terns. Talk about "bright-eyed Italian maids!" Among oui 
lower classes there are five beauties to one good-looking woman 
here. It is nonsense to expect beauty among a population thai 
live in filth, and eat the vilest substances to escape the horrors of 
starvation. Wholesome food, comfortable apartments, and cleanly 
clothing, are indispensable to physical beauty; and these the 
Italians, except the upper classes, do not have. The filthy dens' 
in which they are crammed, the tattered garments in which they 
are but half hid, and the haggard faces of hundreds of unfed wo- 
men and children that meet me at every step as I enter the city 
at night, overthrow all the pleasures of the day, and I retire to 
my room angry with that political and social system that requires 
two-thirds to die of starvation, that the other third may die of sur- 
feit. The King of Naples has five palaces, while thousands of 
his subjects have not one blanket. 

Men talk of travelling when the mind is matured, but I advise 
every one who wishes to enjoy Italy to visit it before he has 
thought of the irregularities and miseries of the world. Let him 
come into this beautiful clime while the imagination holds supreme 
sway, and life is a golden dream. He then will see but its tem- 
ples and arts, hear but the voice of the past, and grow enthusi- 
astic on a soil where every stone is a monument, and every wall 
a history. I could weep when I see the havoc that tyranny and 
avarice make of the happiness of man. Why is it that these 
thousands around me should weep and suffer and die, that one 
lazy Prince may gorgeously furnish five palaces he enters but 
five times a year ? Why should Lazzaroni multiply to be cursed 
by every stranger, merely that a few lazy nobles may turn a 
whole country into beautiful villas to gallop through? Italy 
abounds in lovely scenery, and is rich in classic associations ; but 
he must be a stupid observer, or a heartless one, who can see and 
feel nothing else. As I wander through the grounds of a princely 
noble, I enjoy the beauty and taste that surround me, until 
mounting some point of view I look down on a lovely country 
filled with half- fed men, and then I could hang him on one of hia 



76 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

own oaks. There stands a glorious statue, but under it lies a live 
sufferer. There is a magnificent church, but on its ample steps 
are heaps of rags, each enveloping a living, suffering man. But, 
as the Italians say, " la pazienza e la confidenza." Yes — pa- 
tience and confidence : for the ridiculous farce of Kings will have 
an end, and humanity yet shake off its rags and lay aside its 
shame, and assert and take its long-withheld rights. 

Yours, fee. 



ASCENT OF VESUVIUS. 



LETTER XVII. 

Ascent of Vesuvius, 

Naples, March, 1843. 

Dear E. — We have been to Mount Vesuvius, and to-day has 
been one of the richest days of my life. The morning was bright 
and clear, and the road lay along the Bay of Naples. We made 
a short stop at Portici, where the King has a palace. It is beau- 
tifully situated, with gardens and promenades around it, and all 
the luxuries that royalty can so easily afford. The taste and 
beauty of the interior, however, are chiefly owing to Madame 
Murat, the ex-Queen of Naples, who reformed not only this, but 
all the royal palaces of the city. When the dethroned Ferdi- 
nand returned from Sicily, he was exceedingly pleased with the 
improvements his conqueror had made, and very good-humoredly 
remarked that " Murat was an excellent upholsterer." The por- 
traits of Napoleon's and Murat's families are still there, and said 
to be excellent likenesses. The whole palace is in excellent taste, 
but the only thing remarkable in it is a porcelain room, the walls 
and ceilings of which are entirely covered with china from the 
celebrated manufactory of Capo di Monti, specimens of which 
are now seldom found. These porcelain panels are painted 
with landscapes, and bordered with wreaths in alto-relievo ; col- 
ored like life, and as large ; with squirrels and birds mingled in 
charming confusion. The frames of the mirrors and the chande- 
liers are of the same material, and the effect of the whole is sin- 
gular and pleasing. I hurried through the rooms, anxious to be 
on the side of Vesuvius. 

We soon came to the place where horses and donkeys are 
taken for the ascent, and here a scrambling and squalling and 
quarrelling commenced that would not have disgraced a steamboat 
landing at New York. In the morning when we started, a man 



78 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

mountea the box of the carriage with the driver, as if he owned 
it. I asked him what he was doing there. He inquired if I did 
not wish a guide. I replied, " Yes, of course, to ascend the 
mountain." Supposing all was right, we went on. But here I 
discovered that a horse could not be had without a guide to ac- 
company him. I turned to my friend of the coach-box and asked 
what it meant, and why he had presumed to fasten himself on 
me in this way. He seemed to be somewhat flustered, but replied 
with a great deal of suavity, " Oh, sir, to see you are not cheated, 
and to hctve everything arranged on your return." " I can take 
care of that," said I ; "I don't mean to be cheated by you or 
others either." But the day was advancing, and this was no 
place or time to quarrel with him, for it would only swell the Ba- 
bel that already clattered around me. My friend at length 
mounted a good-looking horse, while the most villanous donkey 
that ever went unsheared was led up to me. I asked my super- 
numerary guide if this was the animal he had come thus far to 
provide me with. He said he thought it was an excellent beast. 
I replied I was sorry I could not agree with him, and deliberately 
walked away. The owner then threw himself before me, witn 
his demure, shaggy, long-eared friend, determined I should take 
him. I asked him if he called that a horse. " No, your excel- 
lency, but an eccellentissimo Ass." " No," said I very coolly, 
*' you are mistaken ; it is neither an ass nor a horse." He looked 
in astonishment at me, as much as to say, " What do you mean ? 
what is it then ?" The others had become quiet by this time, 
and stood waiting the issue. " Why," said I, " don't you see ifs 
a rat — a large water-rat — you are wishing me to ride ?" The 
men looked at each other in astonishment for a moment, and then 
burst into a loud laugh. Seeing I was not to be duped, they led 
me out a very nice grey pony, which 1 mounted; and galloped 
away. 

The guide, with a strong stick in one hand, seized my friend's 
horse by the tail, and trotted after. The ascent for some time 
was gradual; the road passing through vineyards from which 
Lachryma Christi, tears of Christ (as a certain kind of wine is 
called), is made. The scene gradually grew drearer until we 
came to the region of pure lava. I can convey to you no idea 



ASCENT OF VESUVIUS. 79 

of the feelings this utterly barren lava-desert at first excites. 
There it spreads, black, broken and rough, just as it cooled in its 
slow and troubled march for the sea. Here it met an obstacle 
and rose into a barrier ; there it fell off into ridges that cracked 
and broke into fragments, till the whole inclined plain that spreads 
off from the base of the pyramid in which is the crater, appear 
as if the earth had been violently shaken till all the large and 
loose portions had risen to the surface. Sometimes you can trace 
for some distance a sort of circular wall of cooled lava, behind 
which the red-hot stream had gathered and glowed like a brow 
of wrath. Nothing could be more dreary and desolate. Through 
this barren tract I was passing in a narrow path. My eye wan- 
dered hither and thither over the scathed and blackened mass, 
but always came back to the solemn peak from whose top silently 
ascended a heavy column of smoke. Soon after, we mounted a 
ridge of earth that the volcano had spared, and on which stood 
the Hermitage. Before reaching it we could see on its narrow 
top, extending nearly to the base of the peak, the forms of mules 
and horses slowly marching in Indian file, and carrying a com- 
pany in advance of us to the same destination. Their appear- 
ance at that distance and above us, cast in bold relief against the 
clear sky, was novel and picturesque. We did not stop at the 
Hermitage, but pushing straight on soon reached the field of lava, 
through which our animals picked their way with most praiseworthy 
care. As I was slowly crossing this rough tract, I saw in the 
distance twenty or thirty mules and horses, saddled and bridled, 
scattered around at the base of the peak, amidst the lava, and on 
the open mountain side, like an Arab camp in the desert. Here 
we also dismounted, and began the almost perpendicular ascent. 

The company before us looked like dwarfs clinging to the side 
of the mountain. There was a lady among them, who, with a 
bridle around her waist, was pulled up by the guide. Ours also 
started with a bridle, but I told him to throw it away, as I could 
take care of myself. Halfway up we came upon a snow-bank, 
on which I cooled my parched lips. Again and again we were 
compelled to rest, but without regret, for whenever we turned our 
eyes below, they were met by one of the most magnificent pros- 
pects the sun ever shone upon. There were the Bay of Naples, 



80 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

the islands of Capri and Ischia, beyond which the blue Mediter. 
ranean melted away into the mild horizon ; nearer slept the city, 
with its palaces and towers, while far inland, on, on, till the eye 
grew dim with the extended prospect, swept away the whole 
'• campagna felice,'^ or happy country, in a glorious panorama 
of villages, villas, fields, and vineyards. Around me was piled 
lava that had once poured in a red-hot stream where I sat ; and 
close beneath me an immense cavity, where a volcano had once 
raged and died. When near the top, as I stood looking off on tho 
world below, a dense cloud of mist, borne by the wind, swept ovei 
and around me, blotting out in an instant everything from my 
sight. A cold breeze accompanied it, and the sudden change 
from broad sunlight and an almost boundless prospect, to sudden 
twilight and a few feet of broken lava, was so chilling and gloomy, 
that it for a moment damped my ardor. Our guide, however, 
told us it would soon pass, so we rallied our spirits and pushed on. 
At length we reached the top, and lo, a barren, desolate, uneven 
field spread out before us, filled with apertures, from which were 
issuing jets of steam., and over which blew a cold and chilling 
wind, while fragments of mist traversed it like spirits fleeing from 
the gulf that yawned behind them. Passing over this with dainty 
footsteps, and feeling every moment as if the crust would break 
beneath our feet, we reached at last the verge of the crater; and 
the immense basin, with its black, smoking cone in the centre, was 
below us. From the red-hot mouth boiled out fast and fierce, an 
immense column of smoke, accompanied at intervals with a heavy 
sound, and jets of red-hot scoria. This was more than I antici- 
pated. I expected to see only a crater, and a smouldering heap. 
But the mountain was in more than common agitation, and had 
been throughout the winter. It seemed to sympathize with Etna 
and other volcanoes that appear to have chosen this year for a 
general waking up. I could compare ij; to nothing but the work- 
ing of an immense steam-engine. It had a steady sound like the 
working of a heavy piston, while at short intervals the valve 
seemed to lift and the steam escape with an explosion ; and at the 
game time the black smoke and lurid blaze would shoot from the 
mouth, and the red-hot scoria rise forty or fifty feet into the air^ 
At the moment of explosion, the mouth of the cone seemed in a 



ASCENT OF VEfeUVlUS. 81 

blaze, and the masses of scoria thrown out, some of which would 
weigh fifteen or twenty pounds, resembled huge gouts of blood — 
they were of that deep red, fresh color. I deemed myself fortu 
nate in the time I visited it, for I saw a real, living — or as Carlyle 
would say, an authenticated volcano. There was a truth and reality 
and power about it, that chained and awed me. I could count 
the strokes of that tremendous engine as it thundered on in the 
bowels of the earth, and see the fruits of its infernal labor as it 
hurled them into the upper air, as if on purpose to startle man 
with the preparations that were going on under him. That 
mountain, huge as it was, seemed light to the power beneath it, 
and I thought it felt unsteady on its base, as if conscious of the 
strength of its foe. But the ludicrous is always mingled with the 
sublime. As I sat on the edge of the crater, awed by the specta- 
cle before me, our guide approached with some eatables, and two 
eggs that had been cooked in the steam issuing from one of the 
apertures we had passed. My friend sat down very deliberately 
to eat his. I took mine in my hand mechanically, but y/as too 
much absorbed in the actions of the sullen monster below me to 
eat. Suddenly there was an explosion louder than any that had 
preceded it, hurling a larger, angrier mass into the air. My hand 
involuntarily closed tightly over the egg, and I was recalled to my 
senses by my friend calling out very deliberately at my feet to 
know what I was doing. I looked down, and there he sat quietly 
picking the shell from his egg, while mine was running a minia- 
ture volcano over his back and shoulders, I opened my hand, 
and there lay the crushed shell, while the contents were fast 
spreading over my friend's broadcloth. I laughed outright, sac- 
rilegious as it was. So much you see for the imagination you 
have so often scolded me about ^ I had lost my egg, while my 
friend, who took things more coolly, enjoyed not only the eating of 
his, but the consciousness of having eaten an egg boiled in the 
{>team of Vesuvius. 

We next descended into the crater, and however slight a thing 
one may deem it in ordinary times, it was a grave matter for 
me. Both hands and feet had never before been in such urgent 
requisition. The path at times was not a foot wide, and indeed 
was not a path, but clefts in the rocks, where often a single mis- 



82 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

step would have sent one to the bottom of the crater, while lava 
rocks, cracked at their base, and apparently awaiting but a slight 
touch to shake them down on you, hung overhead. Frequently 
my only course was to lie against the rock and cling with my 
hands to the projecting points, while ever and anon, from out soir.e 
aperture would shoot jets of steam so impregnated with sulphur as 
almost to strangle me. My guide would then be hid from my 
sight, and I had nothing to do but hang on and cough, while I 
knew that a thousand feet were above and below me. At other 
times the crater would be filled with vapor up to the rim, shroud- 
ins ever^'tliinff from our si^ht, even the fierv cone, while we huns: 

C5-C5 O' ^ ' O 

midway on the rocks and stood and listened. Amidst the rolling 
vapor I could hear the churning of that tremendous engine, and 
the explosion that sent the scoria into the air, and then, after a 
moment of deep silence, the clatter of the returning fragments, 
like hail-stones on dry leaves, far, far below me. It was suf- 
ficently startling and grand, to stand half-way down that crater, 
with your feet on smoking sulphur and your hand on rocks so 
hot that you shrank from the touch, and gaze down on that terrific 
fire-energy, without wrapping it in gloom and adding deeper mys- 
tery to its already mysterious workings. ,A puff of air would 
then sweep through the ca\dty, dashing the mist against its sides 
and sending it like frightened spirits over the verge. I almost ex- 
pected to see a change when the light again fell on it, but there 
it stood, churning on as steady and stern as ever. 

We at length reached the bottom, and sitting down at a respect- 
ful distance from the base of the cone, enjoyed the sublime 
spectacle. There we were, deep down in the bowels of the 
mountain, while far up on the brink of the crater, like children in 
size, sat a group of men sending their hurrah down at every dis- 
charge of scoria. Before me ascended the column of rolling 
smoke, while every few seconds the melted mass was ejected into 
the air with a report that made me measure rather wistfully the 
distance between us and the top. Our guide took some coppers, 
and as the scoria fell a little distance off, he would run up the 
sides of the cone, drop them in the smaller portions, and retreat 
before a second discharge. It was amusing to see how coolly he 
would stand and look up to the descending fragments of fire, 



ASCENT OF VESUVIUS. 83 

some of which, had they struck him, would have crushed him to 
the earth; and calculate their descent so nicely that with a slight 
movement he could escape each. When the scoria cooled, the 
coppers were left imbedded in it, and thus carried off as remem- 
brances of Vesuvius. We went around the crater, continually 
descending until we came to the lowest part, close to the base of 
the cone. Here the lava was gathering and cooling and cracking 
off in large rolls, with that low continuous sound which is always 
made by the rapid cooling of an intensely heated mass. I 
ascended a little eminence which the lava was slowly undermin- 
ing, and thrust my cane into the molten substance. It was so 
]iot that I had to cover my face with my cap in order to hold my 
stick in it for a single moment. As I stood and saw fold after 
fold slowly roll over and fall off, and heard the firing of the vol- 
cano above me, and saw, nearly a hundred feet over my head, 
red-hot masses of scoria suspended in the air, I am not ashamed 
to say I felt a little uncomfortahle. I looked above and around, 
and saw that it needed but a slight tremulous motion to confine 
me there for ever. It was not the work of five or ten minutes to 
reach the lofty top, and a little heavier discharge of fire — a small 
shower of ashes — and I should have been smothered or crisped in 
a moment. There may have been no danger, but one cannot es- 
cape the belief of it when at times he is compelled to dodge 
flaming masses of scoria, that otherwise would smite him to the 
earth. 

We ascended by a different and much easier path. It is lon- 
ger, but far preferable to the one we came down. It led us to 
the other side of the crater, from which we looked down on Pom- 
peii. I could trace the stream of lava to the plain, and could 
well imagine the consternation of the inhabitants of the doomed 
city, as the storm of ashes shot off for its bosom. Weary and 
exhausted, we descended by a different route through a bed of 
ashes that reached from the top to the bottom of the hill, mounted 
our horses and rode homeward. The glorious plain was spread 
out before us, but we were too tired to enjoy it. At the bottom 
of the hill we found our supernumerary guide half-drunk on our 
credit, who told us he had soup, fish, beef, fowl, fruit, et cetera, 
provided for our entertainment in a neighboring house, which 



84 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

proved to be a hovel. The provisions, he said, had cost but little 
more than a dollar, while the man asked only about the same for 
cookmg them. I was thoroughly vexed, and told him to say to 
the man he might have the provision to pay for cooking them ; 
and as for him, I considered him the greatest scoundrel I had yet 
met with, and I had seen many. He replied that he regarded me 
as his son — ^that he would not see me cheated of a grana for the 
world. I told him I thought the proofs of his affection were ra- 
ther dubious, that it had cost me about three dollars that day, and 
it was altogether too expensive for me, and also, notwith- 
standing the intensity of his love, that v/e liad better part. And 
yet, would you believe it, this fellow had the impudence to come 
up to the carriage and ask me to make him a present of a few 
carlines, as a sort of farewell gift ! It was really the coolest 
rascality I had yet encountered. But the day passed away, and 
the evening, with its welcome repose, came. That night I slept 
as I had never slept before. It was like oblivioii, it was so deej 
and unbroken. 

Truly yours. 



ITALIAN WOMEN. 85 



LETTER XVIII. 

The Ladies of Italy and the Ladies of America. - 

Naples, March, 1843. 

Dear E. — Who has not heard the exclamations, " The black- 
eyed Beauties of Italy — The Blue Heavens of Italy !" and that, 
too, in contrast with our own beautiful women and clear atmos- 
phere, until he has dreamed of a sunny land wreathed with rivers, 
and filled with radiant, passionate creatures ? At another time I 
shall contrast the climates. 

At present, reversing the rules of rhetoric, I take the most in- 
teresting objects first ; and as to these dark-eyed beauties — dark- 
eyed enough though they are, and very pretty withal — ^yet, like many 
other things in this world, they appear much better when dreamed 
about, with four thousand miles of ocean between us, than when 
looked at from these promenades dressed a la Frangais. It is not 
the partiality one naturally feels for his countrywomen that gov- 
erns me, when I say that the beautiful women with us stand to 
them in the proportion of five to one. Walk on a pleasant day at 
the promenading hour from the Astor House to Bleecker-street, and 
you shall see more beautiful women than you will find in any 
Italian city, though you walk it a month. Similar contrasts 
might be drawn between many other things in the two countries, 
in which we have heretofore suffered unjustly. This declaration 
cannot be attributed to prejudice, for you know I was a perfect 
child in my enthusiasm for Italy. It was the land of my early 
dreams — the one bright vision in all my scholar's life, and when 
its blue hills rose on my view I felt like the pilgrim as he catches 
the first glimpse of the Prophet's Tomb from afar. Yet the truth 
* maun be said.' — Perhaps one would see more beauty were the 
young ladies permitted to appear more in society. The foolish 
custom of shutting them up in convents, occupied with their studies, 



86 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

until married off hy their parents, still prevails. It is, however, 
losing somewhat of its ancient force, especially in Tuscany. The 
truth is, we have derived our ideas of Italy from England, which is 
not distinguished for its beautiful peasantry. Accustomed also 
to the light hair and fresh complexion of the Saxon race, the 
English fall in raptures at sight of the dark-eyed beauties of 
the South. The same is true of climate. Coming from the fogs 
of London, Avhere the sun seems made in vain, they are in ecsta- 
cies with the bright heavens of Italy. The sky is at times like a 
sapphire dome, and its blue often of a peculiar tinge ; but the dif- 
ference, in this respect, between it and our own is not so great as 
many imagine. 

Genoa has been regarded from time immemorial as the most 
celebrated of all Italian cities, for the beauty of its women. In 
that city I resided nearly six months, and mingled freely in every 
class of society. Being an invited guest to all the large assem- 
olies and soirees of the nobility, I had eveiy opportunity of seeing 
society in its most brilliant coloring. I shall never forget my disap- 
pointment at the first great soiree I attended. I expected to be daz- 
zled by the array of beauty, as it was given by the highest officer 
of the city, but did not see but one really pretty woman during the 
evening. It is rather singular also that those vrho have the repu- 
tation of being beauties, among the Italians, usually have the light 
hair and eyes and fair skin of the Saxon race ; indeed the most 
beautiful women I have seen here have been English women. My 
taste may not be correct, but there is a character in the expression 
of an Eno-lish woman's face that vou look for in vain in an Italian. 
It has also, a half proud look, which I like, although it gives a 
coldness to her manner. 

At the casinos in this country, I have often met the entire beauty 
of the upper classes of the city ; and although certainly many 
very pretty women were present, yet the average of beauty was 
low. With fourteen rooms thrown open, and all so crowded that 
one could hardly move, one would expect some beauty in any 
city, and he finds it here : but I am quite sure if national beauty is 
worth being proud of, we can boast over Italy — ^that is, in our 
women ; I wish I could say as much of the men. It is not so easy 
to decide on the peasantry ; they differ so much in different prov 



ITALIAN WOMEN. 87 



mces. Sometimes you may travel all day and see nothing but 
the ugliest faces, and you wonder how nature could have gone so 
awry in every instance ; and then again in another province you 
see at every step the beautiful eye and lash, and flexible brow, 
and laughing face of your true Italian beauty. 

In form the Italians excel us. Larger, fuller, they naturally 
acquire a finer gait and bearing. It is astonishing that our ladies 
should persist in that ridiculous notion that a small waist is, and, 
per necessita, must be beautiful. Why, many an Italian woman 
would cry for vexation, if she possessed such a waist as some of 
our ladies acquire, only by the longest, painfuUest process. I 
have sought the reason of this difference, and can see no other 
than that the Italians have their glorious statuary continually be- 
fore them, as models ; and hence endeavor to assimilate them- 
selves to them ; whereas our fashionables have no models except 
those French stuffed figures in the windows of milliners' shops. 
Why, if an artist should presume to make a statue with the shape 
that seems to be regarded with us as the perfection of harmionious 
proportion, he would be laughed out of the city. It is a standing 
objection against the taste of our women the world over, that they 
will practically assert that a French milliner understands how 
they should be made better than Nature herself. 

It is the manners of the Italians, which is the real cause 
of the preference given them by all travellers. This alone 
makes an immense difference between an Italian and an Ameri- 
can city. Broadway, with all its array of beauty, never inclines 
one to be lively and merry. The ladies (the men are worse 
of course) seem to have come out for any other purpose than 
to enjoy themselves. Their whole demeanor is like one sit- 
ting for his portrait. Everything is just as it should be, to be 
looked at. Every lady wears a serious face, and the ^vhole 
throng is like a stiff country party. The ladies here, on th 
contrary, go out to be merry, and it is one perpetual chatte. 
and laugh on the public promenades. The movements are all 
different, and the very air seems gay. I never went down 
Broadway at the promenade hour feeling sad, without com- 
ing back sadder, while I never returned from a public prome- 
nade in Italy without thinking and saying to myself, " Well, 



88 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

this must be a very comfortable world, after all, for people do 
enjoy themselves in it amazingly."' This difference is still more 
perceptible on personal acquaintance. An Italian lady never sits 
and utters common-places with freezing formality. She is more 
flexible, and, indeed, if the truth must be said, better natured and 
happier than too many of my countrywomen. She is not on the 
keen look-out lest she should fail to frown every time propriety 
demands. 

There is no country in the world where woman is so worship- 
ped, and allowed to have her own way as in America, and yet 
there is no country where she is so ungrateful for the place and 
power she occupies. Have you never in Broadway, when the 
omnibus was full, stepped out into the rain to let a lady take your 
place, which she most unhesitatingly did, and with an indiffer- 
ence in her manner as if she considered it the merest trifle in the 
world you had done ? How cold and heartless her " thank ye," 
if she gave one ! Dickens makes the same remark with regard 
to stage-coaches — so does Hamilton. Now, do such a favor for 
an Italian lady, and you would be rewarded with one of the 
sweetest smiles that ever brightened on a human countenance. I 
do not go on the principle that a man must always expect a re- 
ward for his good deeds ; yet, when I have had my kindest offices 
as a stranger, received as if I were almost suspected of making 
improper advances, I have felt there was little pleasure in being 
civil. The " grazie, Signore," and smile with which an Italian 
rewards the commonest civility, would make the plainest woman 
appear handsome in the eyes of a foreigner. 

They also become more easily animated, till they make it all 
sunlight around them. They never tire you with the same mo- 
notonous aspect, but yield in tone and look to the passing thoughl, 
whether it be sad or mirthful ; and then they are so free from all 
formality, and so sensitively careful of your feelings. I shall 
never forget one of the first acquaintances I made in Italy. I 

was at the Marquis of* 's one evening, conversing with some 

gentlemen, when the Marquis came up and said, " Come, let me 
introduce you to a beautiful lady" — indeed she was the most 
beautiful Italian woman I had ever seen. I declined, saying I 
did not understand the Italian language well enough to converse 



ITALIAN WOMEN. 89 



with so brilliant a creature, " for you know (said I) one wants to 
say very clever things in such a case, and a blunder would be 
dreadful." "Pooh, pooh," said he, "come along" — and taking 
me by the shoulders led me forward, and forced me down into a 
chair by her side, saying, "Now talk." If she had been half 
as much disconcerted as I was, I should have blundered beyond 
redemption : but the good-natured laugh with which she regarded 
the Marquis's performance entirely restored my confidence, and I 
stumbled along in the Italian for half an hour, without her ever 
giving the least intimation, by Iook or word, that I did not speak 
it with perfect propriety. 

This same naivete of manner extends itself everywhere. If 
you meet a beautiful peasant girl, and bow to her, instead of re- 
senting it as an insult, she shows a most brilliant set of teeth, and 
laughs in the most perfect good humor. As I was once coming 
down from Mount Vesuvius, I passed an Italian lady with her 
husband, who by their attendants I took for persons of distinction, 
I had an immense stick in my hand, with which I had descended 
into the crater. As I rode slowly by, she turned to me in the 
pleasantest manner, and said, " Ha un grand bastone, signore " 
(you have got a large cane, sir). I certainly did not respect her 
less for her " forwardness ! !" (civility), but on the contrary felt 
I would have gone any length to have served her. 

Indeed, this same freedom from the ridiculous frigidity, which 
in my country is thought an indispensable safeguard to virtue, is 
found everywhere in Europe. It has given me, when a solitary 
stranger, many a happy hour on the Rhine, and on the Mediter- 
ranean. In my late passage from Civita Vecchia to Naples in a 
steamer, I met an instance of this, in the Russian baron and lady, 
and the pretty young Finlandess his niece. I forgot to mention 
the manner in which our acquaintance commenced. The old 
gentleman and his niece were sitting on deck enjoying the moon- 
light, and looking off on the shores of Italy and the islands past 
which we were speeding like a spirit ; while I was slowly pacing 
backwards and forwards, thinking now of the sky I was under, 
and now of the far home on which a colder moonlight was sleep- 
ing, when the old baron pleasantly accosted me, and we slid off 
into an easy conversation. Soon after he went into the cabin a 



90 LETTEES FROM ITALY. 

short timej when, passing by the Finlandess, she addressed me so 
pleasantly and ladv-like, that I was perfectly charmed with her 
civility. Ah, said I to myself a solitary stranger would have 
promenaded the deck of a vessel in my fatherland long, before 
one of my beautiful countrywomen would have uttered a word 
to cheer him, and make Him long after bless her in his heart. 

The Italian has another attraction peculiar to the beings of 
warm climes — she possesses deeper emotions than those of colder 
latitudes, while she has less power to conceal them. The dark 
eye flashes out its love or it^hatred as soon as felt ; and in its 
intense and passionate gaze is an eloquence that thrills deeper 
than any language. She is a being ail passion, which gives 
poetry to her movements, looks, and words. It has made her 
land the land of song, and herself an object of interest the world 
over. A beautiful eye and eyebrow are more frequently met 
here than at home. The brow is peculiarly beautiful — not merely 
from its regularity, but singular flexibility. It will laugh of itself, 
and the slight arch always heralds and utters beforehand the 
piquant thing the tongue is about to utter ; and then she laughs 
&D sweetly ! Your Italian knows how to laugh, and, by the way, 
she knows how to walk, which an American lady does not. An, 
American walks better than an English woman, who steps like a 
grenadier, but still she walks badly. Her movements lack grace, 
ease, and naturalness. 

Yet notwithstanding all this, beauty of face is more common at 
home than here. I will not speak of moral qualities, for here the 
" dark-eyed beauty "' of Italy must lose in comparison ', and, in- 
deed, with all her passionate nature, she is not capable of so 
lasting afiection as an American. It is fiercer, wilder, but more 
changeable. 

Truly yours. 



ISLANDS ABOUT NAPLES. JJ 



LETTER XIX. 

Islands about Naples — ^Virgil's Scenes, &c. 

Naples, April. 

Deau E.- -I designed to have given one letter on the Islands 
around Naples, and another on the ruins that cover the ground 
that Virgil has made so classic. But really Virgil never was my 
admiration ; and his Uiver Styx, and Acheron, and Sea of the 
Dead, and Avernus, and above all, his Elysian Fields, are such 
entire creations of the imagination that I cannot with a sober face 
speak of them with the dignity that the scholar asks. So one let- 
ter must answer for the whole region. The truth is, Styx cannot 
be found, and Avernus is but a fish-pond, and the Elysian Fields 
a little bank that was once used for a Cemetery. Yet when I 
came to see these localities of Virgil's ^neid, I had a greater re- 
spect for him than ever before. He had more imagination than 
I gave him credit for. It is not every one that could gather two 
"Worlds and the passage between them into so narrow and ordi- 
nary a place. The truth is, this region was the resort of the 
Emperors, and Philosophers, and Poets of Rome, in their leisure 
hours. On this beautiful shore they built villas and temples, and 
adorned every hill-top, and made every glen and pool mysterious 
by the gods and nymphs they gathered around them. Virgil 
wrote for royal ears, and hence chose a spot that would flattei 
those whose favor he sought. 

Near by is the ancient Cumee, the Temple of Apollo, where 
Daedalus alighted in his winged flight from Crete ; and, right be- 
low, the shore where jEneas drew up his ships, and the very cave 
to which he ascended to consult the Cumsean Sybil. Here Tar- 
quinius Superbus found an asylum, and here, long after, Alaric 
piled his spoils. The whole shore and hill-side is covered with 
ruined temples dedicated to Venus, Apollo, Mercuiy, Diana, &c. 

Q 



92 LE ITERS FROM ITALY. 

Once this shore must have been a picture. Two things interested 
me more than all others, as they were not fictions of the imagina- 
tion : — One was a view from the top of the Sybil's Cave, of the 
Tomb of Scipio Africanus, standing " solitary and alone" on the 
far sea-shore. Thither in pride and scorn the old hero retired, 
and died and was buried. It is close on the beach, all alone, 
looking proudly desolate. The sea murmurs around it, and the 
night-tempest howls by — making the only dirge that is chanted 
over the proud chieftain. The other was the harbor of Misenum. 
As I stood on the summit of the hill that overlooked the now 
ruined and desolate harbor, on which not even a fisher's boat was 
moored, with here and there an arch just rising from the water, 
where an earthquake had tumbled it, it did not seem possible that 
there the Roman fleet was wont to ride in its glory. Yet it was 
anchored here, commanded by Pliny the elder, at the time of the 
eruption of Vesuvius that buried Pompeii. In this very harbor 
occurred a scene that well-nigh changed the destinies of the 
World. Right below me, on that quiet, unconscious sheet of 
water, now so lonely-looking and desolate, sat once the galley oi 
Sextus Pompeius, and on board of it Octavius Caesar and Antony 
at dinner. Light as a sea-bird she sat on the wave, while those 
master-spirits discussed together the fate of the World. During 
dinner, Pompey's Admiral, formerly his slave, whom he had freed 
and honored, came and whispered in his ear — " Shall I cut the 
cable and make you master of the World V^ " Why did you not 
do so without asking me?" answered Pompeius. " My word is 
now given, and I must abide by it." One good stroke of the 
knife then would have changed the fate of Rome and the World. 
On that single rope hung immense destinies, and the fingers were 
already feeling the handle of the knife that should sever it. On 
a rope did I say ? On a lighter thing than that : on a man's 
word ! Poor man ! he would do a thousand lies to gain a trifling 
object, but yet would not utter one aloud in the ears of the World 
for an Empire. Ah ! methinks after all, that fear of human 
scorn had more to do with the h^olding of that rope than sense of 
obligation. To ordinary men princes may utter what falsehoods 
they please. Mere will is holier than obligation, and the bare 
questioning the right by others is bolder thay their own violation 



VIRGIL'S SCENFS. 93 



of it. Pompeius could deceive, and rob, and slay the mass by 
thousands ; but deliberately to lie to great Csesar, and turn dark 
traitor at his own table, would be an act at which the World 
would cry out '' Shame." 

" Ah, this thou should'st have done, 
• And not have spoke on't ! In me 'tis villainy ; 

In thee it had been good service. Thou must know, 
'Tis not my profit that does lead mine honor ; 
Mine honor, it. Repent that e'er thy tongue 
Hath so betrayed thine act : Being done unknown, 
I should have found it afterwards well done ; 
But must condemn it now." 

This queer distinction in morals must have puzzled old Menas 
sadly, and we wonder he did not immediately add, " N&ver mind, 
Pompey, I'll never tell any one you knew any thing about it ; so 
here goes the rope." And yet we do not exactly see how Pompey 
could have reconciled it with his delicate conscience to have 
killed his guests after he had got out to sea, even if the rope had 
been cut without his knowledge. 

The Sybil's Cave is not so much of a sham. The extent of 
this grotto or cavern is unknown ; but doubtless the whole moun- 
tain is bored through, and was used formerly as a means of com- 
munication between different portions of these ancient strong- 
holds. From the side that looks directly on the sea, and near 
where ^Eneas landed, one sees but little of the immense cavern 
that dives into the mountain. Our guide, however, lighted his 
torches, and led us through long and dark passages until the ruins 
blocked the arches and stopped our progress. The entrance from 
the other side of the hill is on the shore of Virgil's Tartarus. A 
beautifully shaded walk leads to it, which opens dark and gloom- 
ily in the mountain. Here our torches were again lighted, and 
we entered from the shores of the very same Tartarus where 
^neas entered in his ^descensus facile^ into hell. You pass 
along a level gallery for some time illuminated only by the glare 
of your torches, and then reach an abrupt descent into a dark 
and narrow passage. My guide here put the torch into my hand 
and bade me mount. Holding it in one hand and grasping his 
neck with the other, I mounted his brawny shoulders, and the 



S4 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

next moment found my feet dragging through the water. My 
torch would light up here and there a projecting point of rock, 
and fling its red light on the black-smeared visage of the fellow 
that carried me, till I began to think I really was on the road to 
the lower world and had fairly straddled the Devil's neck. We 
soon emerged into a room half filled with water, which we went 
splashing through into another, on the farther side of which my 
grim carrier set me down on a flight of steps that rose from the 
water. I really began to suspect, as I stood and gazed off into 
the darkness and saw the reflection of the light, now on the arch- 
ed cavern, and now on the water, that Virgil was dealing some- 
what in facts when he described this road to the Infernal World. 
Indeed, I should not have been surprised to have heard the bark 
of old Cerberus or the roar of the Cocytus„ 

In another chamber decorated with Mosaics, are what are 
termed the Sybil's Baths, and also little recesses in which the 
guide said she was accustomed to cool herself after her warm 
ablutions. Coming from a land of steamboats and railroads, 
where everything is practical and real, it seemed odd enough to 
hear men run over these traditions as matters of fact. Before 
you are aware, you find yourself following the narrator as if he 
were relating real occurrences ; and, as he points out the particu- 
lar localities and relates some incident belonging to each, you for 
the moment believe him. Being all told in a foreign tongue, and 
that Italian, adds to the delusion : and I found myself looking 
into the baths, where the beautiful limbs of the Sybil reposed, and 
around on her chambers, as if it all were a fact and not a fiction. 
But when I was shown the narrow hole into which she crawled 
to cool herself after the bath, the beautiful vision vanished. This 
was too much for even my imagination ; and I roused the echoes 
of the Sybil's home by one of those long and hearty laughs that 
does the soul good. My cicerone had run on with increasing 
volubility, distancing Virgil miles out of sight, and adding such 
notes and comments on the way as would have staggered the 
poet to have heard. As he waved the torch to and fro, and 
splashed the water around him, he saw my eyes glaring on him 
like one completely gulled — as I most assuredly was for the time, 
though not by him so much as by my own imagination — and, 



AN ENGLISH LADY. % 



taking the hint, he ' piled up the marvels/ as a Western man 
•would say, ' a little too high.' My hearty, incredulous laugh 
acted like a condenser on his steam, and he began to mistrust I 
was a sensible man. He stopped short, and asked if I did not 
wish to mount. 

An English lady had entered as far as one could without being 
carried, and, impelled by a woman's curiosity, asked to be taken 
into the Sybil's chambers. Without thinking how she was to be 
carried, she was just adjusting her dress, when the guide, stooping 
down, suddenly inserted her carefully astraddle of his neck, and 
plunged into the water. The squeal that followed would have 
frightened all the sybils of the mountains out of their grottoes. It 
was too late, however, to retreat ; — the passage was too narrow 
to turn round in, and she v/as compelled to enter the first cham- 
ber before she could be relieved from her predicament. When 
she came agam into the open day-light, a more astonished and 
pitiable looking object I never beheld. Her elegant bonnet was 
blackened and crushed, and she stood fingering it with an absent 
look, uttering now and then an expression of horror at what she 
nad passed through. 

This entire shore is a heap of ruins, and each ruin a history. 

Fagged out and weary as ever, we drove slowly home in the 
mild evening air. 

Truly yours. 



96 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XX. 



A Visit to Salerno — Ruins of Paestum. 



Salerno, April, 1843 
Dear E. — I have just returned from Paestum. My New York 
friends and myself made a party, and, selecting a beautiful morn- 
ing, started for the deserted city. Our road lay for many miles 
along the Bay, that spread away brightly in the morning sun, 
and through the towns that skirt the base of Vesuvius, and along 
the barren lava-tract near Pompeii, and finally opened into the 
cultivated plains, — when we trotted quietly off towards Salerno. 
Vineyards came up to the road as far as the eye could reach, in- 
terspersed with open cultivated grounds, in which the peasants, in 
their picturesque costume, were gaily at work. The vines in 
this region are trained on tall poplars, that give the vineyards the 
appearance of a wood, and do not produce so fine an effect as 
those farther north. The fields being without fences have an 
open look, and the mingling ot men and women togethei in their 
cultivation give them a chequered appearance, and render them 
very picturesque. In the middle of a large green wheat-fiela 
would be a group of men and women weeding the grain, the red 
petticoats and blue spencers of the latter contrasting beautifully 
with the color of the fields. In one plat of ground I saw a team 
and a mode of ploughing quite unique, yet withal very simple. 
The earth wa^ soft as if already broken up, and needed only a 
little mellowing. To eifect this, a man had harnessed his wife to 
a plough, which she dragged to and fro with all the patience of 
an ox, he the mean time holding it behind, as if he had been ac- 
customed to drive and she to go. This was literally " ploughing 
with the heifer." She, with a strap around her breast, leaning 
gently forward, and he, bowed over the plough behind, presented 
a most curious picture in the middle of a field. The plough here 



A VISIT TO SALERNO. 97 

is a very simple instrument, having but one handle and no share, 
but in its place a pointed piece of wood, sometimes shod v/ith iron, 
projecting forward like a spur; and merely passes through the 
ground like a sharp-pointed stick, without turning a smooth fur- 
row like our own. 

As we approached the Mountains the scenery changed and as- 
sumed a wilder and more varied aspect, V/e stopped at Nocera, 
a place founded it is supposed by the Pelasgi — once taken by the 
Saracens, and once bravely and successfully defended against 
Hannibal. Here is an old Cathedral, about v/hich antiquarians 
have differed much ; and the only safe result finally reached is, 
that it is of great antiquity, and whether originally a Church or 
not, v/as built when Nocera was a far richer and more important 
place. A small collection of houses is near it, from vv^hich 
swarmed children and young women to beg for a few grani. 
Though dirty and ragged, their features were m.uch finer than 
those near Naples. You would have lausjhed to have seen me 
fairly blocked in by babies and urchins, and young vromen 
clamoring for money. Wishing to look in their houses to see 
how they lived, I scattered some small change among them, 
which immediately made them my warm friends ; and the invita- 
tions I had to their dwellings, espenially from those v/ho had not 
yet received any money, were excessively warm and urgent. I 
walked into one house from, which I had seen no one come forth 
to beg. In the centre of the room was a cradle with a sick infant 
in it, while the mother sat at the side of it at work. She was a 
fine-looking woman, and seemed quite superior to the herd that 
dogged my footsteps. She looked up as I entered, and muttered 
something of my impoliteness. I thought she was about half 
right ; but stepping up to the cradle, I inquired after the child 
and laid some money in its hand. Mercy ! what a change ! The 
sullen look with which she had. greeted me passed away, and she 
addressed me with all the blandness of an Italian woman. But 
oh ! what dwellings for human beings ! I have been in the 
quarterings of slaves at the South, but they are comfortable apart- 
ments compared with these. A miserable bed and an old loom, 
with a few chickens and a pig, complete the entire furniture. 1 
passed in and out followed by the same ragged gang, till all at 



98 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

once it occurred to me that these beggars were in general noto 
rious thieves. I had, as I supposed, a note-book in my coat- 
pocket which closed like a pocket-book, and hence presented a 
strong temptation for a thief. I immediately put my hand behind 
me and found it was gone. I was enraged at their ingraiiiude 
There I had been talking good naturedly, and scattering moner 
Among the ragged, vermin-covered little thieves, and they had re. 
u-arded me with stealing my note-book. I mustered my he?J. 
Italian and abused them as a gang of ungrateful pickpockets. 
They looked quite astonished and innocent, and seemed v/illing 
and ardent to find the lost property. Knowing the frequent cases 
of robbery, it did not once occur to me that I might have left the 
thing behind ; and, conscious that as soon as they had opened it 
they would find it valueless, I olTered a reward for its return. 
Men and women ran to and fro screaming to one another, and 
then returned to report progress, Vv'hich was alwa3^s ' Jion si trova/ 
(not found). Our driver exerted himself most patiently, until I 
finally called him back and told him to drive on. As he mounted 
the box, he knocked up his cap on one side, and scratching his 
head with a most knowing look, said : — " I will bet my head you 
have left it at home, for these people dare not steal." There was 
no more to be said on the subject ; and I confess that just that 
moment I remembered I had taken it out of my pocket in the 
office of the hotel as we were starting off, to write a note to our 
Consul, and it was at least possible I had left it behind. The 
thought, I acknowledge, did not please me much, and I would 
have given a little to know I had not wronged the beggars. 

I however soon forgot it all in the glorious scenery that sur- 
rounded us. Woods, rocks, vineyards, streams, castles, convents 
and watch-towers were scattered on every side. Now a sweet 
village lay nestling under a dark-brovred hill ; and now a ruined 
castle stood out in bold relief against the sky, perched on an al- 
most inaccessible peak, around which, in the old lawless times, 
had been many a fierce struggle. Here we passed a solitary 
house peeping out from a mass of foliage in the side of the moun- 
tain, with a little rivulet brawling by it ; and there saw the spire 
of a church shooting up behind a crag on the very summit of a 
high, bald mountain — placed in that eagle-like spot to be half 



A VISIT TO SALERNO. 99 



way between two little villages that lay scattered on either side 
below. The path to it wound and wound up and along the bar- 
ren mass, until it finally dropped into the bosom of the church, 
whose bell, every Sabbath morning, woke the sleeping echoes 
around those villages to call their inhabitants to their mountain 
worsliip. A little farther on, we passed nearly over a village, 
the spires of whose churches barely rose to our carriage-wheels. 
Over the ravine that led into the town was a slender foot-bridge, 
from the farther end of which a narrow path commenced and 
went straggling up the hill, and finally dropping over the ridge, 
was lost from view. I inquired where it went, and was told to a 
little village perched on the farther side that looked down on the 
sea. A few more turns and the beautiful Bay of Salerno opened 
to view, — blue, quiet and mild as heaven. Its natural beauties 
are almost, if not quite, equal to those of Naples. We had 
hardly driven into the yard of our hotel before the usual retinue 
of beggars was behind us. 

In bargaining for our meals and rooms, everything was so 
reasonable that we could not complain ; and for once I did not at- 
tempt to beat down the landlord. The entire arrangement of the 
prices was always left to me in travelling, and I had acquired 
quite a reputation in dickering with the thieving Italian landlords 
and vetturini. We made the man specify the dishes he would 
give us ; and among other things he mentioned an English pud- 
ding. This required some discussion ; but we finally concluded 
not to trust an Italian in Salerno with such a dish, and had its 
place supplied with something else. He promised enough ; and 
I was turning away quite satisfied, when my friends slyly hinted 
at my principle, never to close a bargain with an Italian on his 
own terms. It wouldn't do to lose my reputation ; and so turning 
round, I very gravely said : — " I suppose you will throw in the 
English pudding." He as gravely and with blandness replied : 
— " Oh, yes." A peal of laughter closed the contract and we 
strolled out to see the town. The mountains rise directly over it, 
on the cragged summit of which stands an old fortress. Salerno 
is an old town, and once boasted one of the most celebrated Med- 
ical Schools of Italy. Its Cathedral also has some rich orna 
ments ; but its great beauty is its Bay. We returned to our ho 



100 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

tel, and, sitting down on a balcony that overlooked it, drank in 
the fresli evening air, and feasted on the quiet beauty of the 
scene. The sun went down over Amalfi, pencilling with its last 
beams the distant mountains that curved into the sea beyond 
Pcestum. Along the beach, on which the ripples were laying 
their lips with a gentle murmur, a group of soldiers in their gay 
uniform was strolling, waking the drowsy echoes of evening with 
their stirring bugle-notes. The music was sv/eet ; and at such 
an hour, in such a scene doubly so. They wandered carelessly 
along, now standing on the very edge of the sand where the rip- 
ples died, and now hidden from sight behind some projecting point 
where the sound confined, and thrown back, cam.e faint and dis- 
tant on the ear, till emerging again into view, the martial strain 
sv/elled out in triumphant notes till the rocks above and around 
were alive with echoes. It was a dreamy hour; and just then, 
as if on purpose to glorify the whole, the full moon rose up over 
the sea and poured its flood of light over the waters, tipping every 
ripple with silver, and making the vvhole beach, where the v/ater 
touched it, a chain of pearls. One by one my friends had drop- 
ped away to their rooms till I was left alone. I felt that " night, 
most glorious night," was not sent for slumber. Every vagrant 
sound had ceased, except the very faint murmur of the swell on 
the beach. The grey old mountains were looking down on Sa- 
lerno, and Salerno on the sea ; and all was quiet as night ever is 
when left alone. And yet, quiet and peaceful as it was, it had 
been the scene of stirring conflicts. There were the moonbeams 
sleeping on the v/all against which Hannibal had once thundered 
with his fierce Africans ; and along that beach the wild war-cry 
of the Saracen had rung, and women and children lain in slaugh- 
tered heaps. But the bold Saracen and bolder African had passed 
away, while the sea and the rocks remained the same. I turned 
to my couch, not wondering the poets of the Augustan age sang 
so much and so sweetly of Salerno. 

In the morning we rose with the sun and rattled off merrily for 
Pffistum, still twenty miles distant. For a while we passed 
through cultivated fields, in which were groups of Calabrian peas- 
ants, dressed just as Salvator Rosa has painted them. At length 
we entered on the long and pestiferous swamps, in the midst of 



RUINS OF P^STUM. 15 

which Psestum stands, or rather stood. For miles and miles I 
was the same dead level, with nothing to relieve the eye but her« 
and there a straw and mud hut, shaped like a bee-hive, in which 
the keepers live who watch the herds driven here to graze ; and 
the herds of buffaloes themselves that roam over the plain. These 
buffaloes are v/ild-looking creatures, but tame as our farm-yard 
cattle. Each has its peculiar name, which it knows like a dog, 
and the overseer rides among them, calling to this and that, as a 
huntsman to his pack of hounds. We passed in sight of the Royal 
Chateau and Hunting- Grounds of Persano, which seemed the only 
fertile spot in sight. 

At length the ancient Temples became visible in the distance, 
and gradually brightened as we approached, till they stood clear 
and well-defined in all their naked grandeur and fine proportions 
against the summer-sky. There are but three of them, Ceres, 
Neptune, and the Basilica, as it is termed. I had imaged to my- 
self crumbling walls, falling arches, and masses of ruins. But 
all such fragments had long ago been melted by time into the 
common mass of earth ; and these three naked, perfect skeletons 
are left standing alone. The roofs are fallen in, and yet you 
scarcely notice it till you enter them. They are all in the form 
of parallelograms, composed entirely of columns with their en- 
tablatures. 

After wandering through them we went to a stream near by, 
whose petrifying qualities formed the stone from which the Temples 
were reared. It is called Travertine, and still lines the borders 
of the stream in immense quantities. The peasantry told me it 
still possessed this remarkable property, and that a cane left in it 
would in six months be converted into stone. We collected some 
curious specimens, and returned to the Temple of Neptune. 
Here, on the fragment of an old column, our servant had spread 
our " dejeuner ;" and the mysterious Past was forgotten in the 
strong demands of a keen appetite. After I had finished I threw 
a chicken-bone and an orange-peel to Neptune, and without wait- 
ing for the oracle's answer, prepared -to depart. The clouds 
were fast gathering on the sky ; — ^the wind was increasing, and 
here and there a drop of rain admonished us to hasten away. 
We reached here about dusk. The bells were gaily ringing, and 



102 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

the town was illuminated, in honor of the birth of a Princess to 
the Queen of Naples. Lonely, exhausted, and weary, I think of 
you and home to-night, and the wide sea that rolls between us. 
But even you grow dim under the stronger claims of Somnus, and 
I ilirow down my pen to -creep to my couch. 

Truly yours. 



CASTELLAMARE. 103 



LETTER XXI. 

Castellamare — The Italian — A Storm at Naples, &.c 

Castellamare, April, 1843. 
Dear E. — "Castellamare!" — it is quite a high-sounding name, 
and has doubtless once been an important stronghold, but it is now 
only a small town. It is interesting chiefly as the site of ancient 
Stabia, where once the torch of civil war, under Scylla, burned 
high and hotly. It seems impossible, as one stands on these vine- 
covered grounds of a bright spring-day and looks off on so quiet a 
scene, that war and havoc have once ploughed up the very rocks 
around. Yet it is true ; and what the passions of men have left, 
Vesuvius has taken for its prey. The storm of fire and ashes 
that buried Pompeii stooped also on this town, and gave it a buri- 
al-place here upon the rocks that overlook the sea. An old cas- 
tle still stands on the edge of the water, which once must have been 
impregnable. There are some mineral springs in the place, and 
other things of trifling importance which we did not see. The 
main object of interest was the view from the heights, which we 
mounted without the aid of donkeys, although pressed upon us 
with surprising liberality by their owners. At length, after toil- 
ing up a long ascent shaded by ilexes, and which Royalty never 
yet mounted on foot, we reached the Royal Villa, and passing it, 
went up, up, till we came to the " Queen's Place of Prospect." 
It was a beautiful view ; and made, thank Heaven, not for a 
Queen, but for Man — for every man who has a soul to enjoy it. 
I'o liim they belong by a " peculiar right." The sea lay below 
us, swept by a strong gale, against which, here and there, was a 
ship leaning to the blast and beating anxiously into port. Closer 
m stood two war vessels, clothed from mast-head to deck, in flags, 
gaily flaunting out in honor of the birth of another Prince, — whiles 



104 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

farther off, the islands of Capri and Ischia looked blue and qiiel 
as ever in their sea home. 

Naples, ten or fifteen miles distant, bent beautiful as evei 
around the Bay, — while off on the right in solemn grandeur, tow- 
ered away Vesuvius, lifting its solemn invocation to Heaven, with 
the lonely ruins of Pompeii sleeping humbly at its feet. Oh ! 
how mournful they looked in that smoky atmosphere, as if scarce- 
ly daring to lift their heads in sight of their old and triumphant 
foe. Vesuvius seems omnipresent to the traveller around Naples ; 
he cannot turn a point, or ascend an eminence, or look back on 
his path, without beholding that bold, bleak mountain, gazing 
moodily down upon him.. It seems to stand so conspicuously as 
if on purpose to remind the gay Neapolitans that danger is ever 
near. 

Our guide was a talkative fellow, and seemed not in the least 
afraid to express his opinions. Indeed, he was a thorough-going 
Democrat, and. if he had the privilege of voting, would most cer- 
tainly cast his ballot against Kings. I have always endeavored 
to get at the real feelings of the lower classes in Italy. Nobles 
and the like are very close-mouthed, knowing their words are 
watched and borne to other ears. When they speak on Govern- 
ments, they speak as if in the audience-chamber of the King ; but 
the Poor, whose words weigh nothing, are allowed to talk as they 
please ; for a few i)ullets will quickly stop their prating when it 
begins to generate action. Hence, I have ever found them quite 
free, and usually yery republican in their thoughts. I inquired 
of our guide hov/ many palaces the king had. "Five," he re- 
plied. " How long does he live in this one during the year V 
" A month, perhaps."—" Ah !" said I, " the king has five palaces, 
then. It must cost something to keep them all in order." — " Ah, 
e vero" (true enough), he rejoined, with that peculiar shrug 
which an Italian knows how to give. " Would it not be better to 
have less — say one or two — and give the avails of the rest to those 
poor wretches I see starving around me ?" "Yes, indeed; but 
it won't be.'' He seemed quite brief in his replies till I changed 
my tone ; and, pointing to the glorious valley that spread inland 
from the sea, dotted with vineyards, said : — " After all, I don't 
know but it is as well. Those people must be very comfortable 



A STORM AT NAPLES. 105 

7onder in the valley. I doubt not they have enough to eat." 
" No, no, Signore," he quickly replied, " they do not have enough 
to eat. The heavy duties take away all they earn. There is 
much misery there," said he, looking off on the lovely plain and 
shaking his head. " Well, but," I asked, " why do you have 
Kings if they burden you so heavily ?" '•' Ah ! what will one 
do ? if we utter too many complaints we are thrown in prison ; 
and what do we gain ?" He seemed to take fire at once ; and, 
hurrying on with all the impetuosity of an Italian, uttered a fear- 
ful tirade against the Government, and ended by saying : — " We 
want another Massaniello to lead us. But the time will come-^ 
let us wait — the time will come when we will do thus to Kings," 
[drawing, as he spoke, a piece of board he held in his banc 
across his throat with a gesture no one could mistake.] His eyi 
fairly flashed as he said this ; but the next m.oment it had all van- 
ished, and, Neapolitan like, he uttered some careless joke. 1 
sometimes think it is v/ell these people are not serious or lasting 
in their feelings. Let a volcano rise up and bury two or three 
cities in any part of England every few years, and the country 
around it would be as desolate and uninhabited as the African 
Desert. But here they build on the lava before it looks fairly 
cold. A Neapolitan never thinks long on one thing ; yet there is 
not a beggar in the street or a fisherman on the Bay that does 
not know the history of Massaniello. He is the People's Wash- 



NAPLES. 

To-night we arrived from Castellamare. Our road wound 
along the Bay — near Pompeii, through Torre del Greco, into 
the city. The sky was darkly overcast — the wind was high 
and angry, and the usually quiet Bay threw its aroused and 
rapid swell on the beach. Along the horizon, between the sea 
and sky, hung a storm-cloud blacker than the water. Here 
and there was a small sailing-craft, or fisherman's boat, pulling 
for the shore, while those on the beach were dragging their boats 
still farther up on the sand, in preparation for the rapidly-gather- 
ing storm. There is always something fearful in this bustling 
preparation for a tempest. It was peculiarly so here. The roar 



106 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

of the surge was on one side ; on the other lay a buried city — 
ft smoking mountain ; while our very road was walled with lava 
that cooled on the spot where it stood. The column of smoke 
that Vesuvius usually sent so calmly into the sky, now lay on a 
level with the summit, and rolled rapidly inland, before the fierce 
sea-blast. It might have been fancy ; but, amid such elemenls 
of strength, and such memories and monuments of their fury, it 
did seem as if it wanted but a single touch to send valley, towns, 
mountain and all, like a fired magazine into the air. Clouds of 
dust rolled over us, blotting out even the road from our view ; 
while the dull report of cannon from Naples, coming at intervals 
on our ears, added to the confusion and loneliness of the scene. 
As we entered the city and rode along the port, the wild tossing 
of the tall masts as the heavy hulls rocked on the waves, the 
creaking of the timbers, and the muffled shouts of seamen, as 
they threw their fastenings, added to the gloom of the evening ; 
and I went to my room, feeling that I should not be surprised to 
find myself aroused at any moment by the rocking of an earth- 
quake under me. The night did not disappoint the day, and set 
in with a wildness and fury, that these fire-countries alone exhibit. 
My room overlooked the Bay and Vesuvius. The door opened 
upon a large balcony. As I stood on this, and heard the groan- 
ing of the vessels below, reeling in the darkness, and the sullen 
sound of the surge, as it fell on the beach, while the heavy thun- 
der rolled over the sea, and shook the city on its foundations, — I 
felt I would not live in Naples. Ever and anon a vivid flash of 
lightning would throw distant Vesuvius in bold relief against the 
sky, with his forehead completely wrapped in clouds that moved 
not to the blast, but clung there, as if in solemn consultation with 
the mountain upon the night. Overhead the clouds were driven 
in every direction, and nature seemed bestirring herself for some 
wild work. At length the heavy rain-drops began to fall, one by 
one, as if pressed from the clouds ; and I turned to my room, 
feeling that the storm would weep itself away. 

Truly yours • 



CAPUA— A PRIEST. 107 



LETTER XXII. 

Capua — A Priest — Cenotaph of Cicero — a Proud Peasant Girl. — Sunset 
on the Sea. 

Alb AND, April. 
Dear E. — Bright and early on Wednesday morning our driver 
cracked his whip through the streets of Naples, and we rattled 
off for old Rome. Do not understand by this, that there was 
any thing like locomotive speed in our movement, for nothing 
would be farther from the truth. We had, however, four horses 
attached to our carriage, and the road was good enough to tempt 
a rapid drive, if the thing had been possible. We entered on a 
flat country covered with vineyards, and crossed with hedges, and 
came at noon to Capua, where we breakfasted. The dirty town 
is strongly garrisoned, and filled with soldiers and priests. An 
old Capuchin friar came into the yard of the inn soon after we 
arrived, rattling his wooden box, and asking in a whining tone 
for charity. He had a most amiable face, and its benevolent ex- 
pression quite charmed me. He seemed to be aware of the im- 
pression he made upon me, for with his cowl thrown back from 
his shaven crown, and his cross and rosary dangling at his rope 
giidle, he approached me in a most insinuating manner, asking 
for alms, and promising to pra.y for me as long as he lived. I 
thought I would test his creed for once ; and so pulling out a 
handful of small change, I rattled it before his greedy eyes and 
said, — " You say then you will pray for me, if I will give you 
money ?" " Si, signore !" " But a priest — your superior in rank, 
has told me, there is no chance for a heretic ; that he did not even 
stop in purgatory, but went straight past into the lowest depths of 
perdition. Now you say you will pray for me ; but if I am 
damned at the outset, j^our prayers will be of no use." " Oh," 
said he^ '' I will pray that you may become a good Catholic." " T 



108 LETTERS i'ROM ITALY. 

am much obliged to you," I replied, " but I wish no such prayers 
for me, with or without money. I am a confirmed heretic, and 
desire to remain so ; so good morning." With this I put my 
money into my pocket. He sav/ it disappear like a treasure 
going into the deep, and wriggled and leered, till his simple face 
expressed more shrewdness than I thought it capable of doing. 
" Oh," said he, " I v/iil pray for your hody, that it may be kept 
well." ''No," replied I; "the doctors will take care of that ; 
besides, the soul is of more importance than the body, and if you 
cannot say there is a chance for me as a heretic, and that you 
will pray for me as such, there's no use of talking farther." The 
covetous fellow was cornered, and he had sense enough to see it. 
He found there was no dodging the point, and finally, with a des- 
perate effort, declared he would pray for my salvation as a 
heretic. I held the money over his box and said, " Now there is 
no mistake about this, and no deception?" "No, signore." 
"Then there is a hope forme?" "Si, signore!" I dropped the 
money in his box, and we then entered on a long conversation 
about his religion. He said he fasted and scourged himself fre- 
quently ; and that lately, in one of his self macerations, the evan- 
gelist Matthew had appeared to him in the form of a baby, and 
that he expected another visit soon. At length, getting weary of 
his nonsense, I bid him good morning ; and he shuffled away^ 
wishing all the blessings of two worlds on my head. 

Towards evening v/e approached a range of hills, and a shower 
that had passed over that part of the country, had clothed every 
thing in a brighter green, while the fresh air from the heights 
around, visited my fevered system, as if on an angel's mission of 
love. I got out of the carriage, and strolled along, drinking in 
health with every breath. I fairly shouted in the new life 
that had suddenly opened around me. Convents perched on the 
side of the green hills, and villages reclining along distant slopes, 
glittered in the yellow sunlight, while not a sound disturbed the 
deep quietness of the scene, save the vesper hymn of the bird, or 
the sweet chime of far off bells. It was an hour of enchant- 
ment. At length, as we made a bend in the road, Vesuvius 
burst on our view, blue and dim in the distance, and sending up 
Its everlasting column of smoke in the evening air. It looked 



CENOTAPH OF CICERO 109 

lonely and sad at that distance, as if almost regretting its own, 
destiny, and weary of its diabolic work. It was with no ordinary 
feelings I bade it farewell. Those great — and if I may use the 
term — active features in scenery, always fasten themselves on my 
affections. 

At night ^ve stopped at a most primitive inn ; it was built 
around a court, with the stables under a part of the chambers, 
adorned with bulrush carpets, and window curtains, &c., of the 
same material. The next day we breakfasted at Mola. Not to 
trouble you with details of the ruins here, and skipping over also 
the ingratitude of a garrulous old woman, who conducted me 
round to see the different objects of interest, I mention only the 
Cenotaph of Cicero, standing near by, erected on the spot where 
he was murdered. He had a villa here, to which he had retired 
from the storm of persecution that was darkening over his liead. 
'• There is a tide in the affairs of men," and he knew that the 
ebb of his own had come. At length he heard that messengers 
were on the way to slay him. Though lying sick and almost 
litlplcss, his fiieiids placed him in a litter, and started for the 
sea, for the purpose of embarking to some distant port. He had 
reached this spot v/hen the murderers met him. The old orator 
saw that his hour had come, and prepared himself for the blow. 
It is said, he met his fate with the composure that became liim. 
His cenotaph consists of three stories, but it is now in ruins. 
Clambering up its rough and ruined sides, I came very near 
Jbreaking my neck, and thus making it stand for Cicero and me 
toofether. However consolino; such an event mio;ht have been to 
my future fame, I was not particularly desirous for such an im- 
mediate association of our names. 

I was pleased with an illustration of pride in a poor peasant 
girl that I passed soon after. We overtook three w^omen, two of 
y/hom immediately began to beg. The third, a dark-eyed, hand- 
some young creature, carrying a load on the top of her head, 
moved on with a stately step without deigning us a look. I ask- 
ed the old women what was her name. They replied, " Elizabet- 
ta."-^So I called out " Elizabetta ! Elizabettai 1" The old wo- 
men laughed, but she never turned her head or gave any sign of 
I saw the blood mantle in her dark brown cheek 



110 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

and her eye flash, and I half regretted my actions, and threw 
me money to the old women : they picked it up with a cry of 
icy, and I could see that Elizabetta. as she turned a moment, and 
saw the amount, was half sorry she had lost it. So I called out 
again, and she turned round, but immediately wheeled back and 
walked on prouder than before — a perfect Dido in her bearing. 
It was amusing to observe the struggle between her pride and her 
need. She saw she had lost more than she could gain by an en- 
tire day's work, yet she was too proud to receive it as a beggar. 

Towards evening we came to Fondi, the spot where Horace 
had such a heart)- laugh over the pomposity of the Prcetor. The 
road from thence to Terracina is anything but pleasant. We 
entered tlie to%^Ti by the famous pass in whicli Hannibal received 
his nrst check from Fabius. It seems strange that so good a gen- 
eral as Hannibal should have attempted to force such a pass, 
against the great odds that were against him. 

Terracina is a dirt}- hole — ^the women blackguards, and the 
landlord a rascal. So much for the to-mi that introduced us into 
the dominions of his holiness. The passage of the twenty miles 
of Pontine marshes next morning was sloomv enough — ^the road 
goes in a straight line as far as you can see : the only terra jirma 
in sight— and wherever the swamp showed a crust tliick enough to 
bear, or mud dense enough to sustain an animal bv sinking to its 
middle, there were buffaloes, half wild, and horses, browsing on 
the stunted herbage. That twenty miles was the gloomiest ride 
I ever took — it seemed like passing through the very valley of 
death. I wonder Tirgil did not fix his Avernus here, no one 
would then have doubted his veracity. Towards evening we be- 
gan to ascend the hill to Yelletri. For miles and miles we 
crawled up the ascent — ^through the town itself, (where our driver 
wished to stay over night, but I would not let hun.) and up the 
n'iountain, which looked back on the drear region stretching away 
to the Pontine marshes. We reached a high elevation just as the 
sun was going down, and a more glorious sunset I never beheld. 
Far, far below us and away, slept the Mediterranean, bluer than 
the heavens over it, while the flaming fire-ball hung only a few 
feet from its surface. L'nderneath it, the waters piled up like a 
hillock of gold, while the heavens beyond seemed like the vei-y 



SUNSET ON THE SEA. Ill 

portals to the world of glory. I gazed and gazed till the glorious 
orb disappeared, and then thought of home and friends. 

The night at length enfolded us, and the stars came out one 
after another, while far away on the horizon, spread dim and 
white the tail of the unannounced comet, that is rushing through 
our system. Amid the deep defiles we went floundering on in 
the dark, our driver, now and then throwing in between his curses 
— " Ain't this a pretty road to ride over in the night ?" and, " Ah, 
a poor vetturino never knows anything." At length we came 
smack up against a team that was standing still in the darkness, 
and amid howling, and screaming, and cursing, that were enough 
to deafen one, I went forward on foot and alone. I walked at 
least ten or twelve miles, and I hailed the lights of Albano, as if 
they had been those of my home. I went to bed thoroughly ex- 
hausted, and have been wandering this morning over this classic 
hill, but will not weary you with a description. 

Yours truly. 



112 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXIII. 

The " Eternal City "—St. Peter's Church. 

Rome, April, \>.?. 
I DATE from the Eternal City. Yesterday we descended the 
Albano along the Appian way, with a scene before us, if not the 
most magnificent, at least the richest in association, of any in the 
world. Just as we were leaving the village, we passed the tomb 
of Pompey the Great, a huge, gray structure, rising in a single 
square tower of gray stone, erected by Cornelia over his ashes. 
He sleeps well with his ivy-covered monument looking down on 
the R-omo that was almost his. Adown the entire descent the 
v/hole desolate campagna of Rome (as far as Socrate) was in 
view. Amid its ruins, with its towers and domes and obelisks, 
arose the modern city, a living tomb-stone over the ancient one 
long dead. Between us and it, like long broken colonnades, 
stretched the miles of her ancient aqueducts. — Beyond, in the 
smoky distance, the blue Mediterranean drew its pencil along the 
sky, making a single line on the horizon, while around all, like 
guardian spirits, seemed to lean in mournful attitude, the ancient, si- 
lent Centuries. The grandeur and the loneliness of the wide scene 
weighed on my heart. Rome, the brightest vision of my early 
dreams, and the IMecca of all my boyish imaginations, was before me, 
and yet how different from those dreams ! A person at home can- 
not appreciate the feelings of one who for the first time looks down 
on imperial Rome. The impressions which the imagination, from 
earliest childhood, has graven on the soul, and the aspect pre- 
sented to the actual eye, are so widely different, that one seems 
struggling between waking and sleeping — he cannot wholly shake 
off the early dream, and he cannot believe that what rises before 
him is all that about which he has dreamed so long. But the 
very desolateness of the campagna around Rome which every 



ST. PETER'S CHURCH. 113 

traveller so deeply regrets is, after all, a great relief to one's feel- 
ings. It harmonises more with their mood and speaks their lan- 
guage. Bright fields and thrifty farm-houses and all the life 
and animation of a richly cultivated country would present too 
strong a contrast to the fallen "glory of the world." But the 
sterile earth, the ruins that lie strev/ed over the plain and the 
lonely aspect all things around it wear, seem to side v/ith the pil 
grim as he muses over the crumbled empire. Besides, his faith is 
not so grievously taxed and his convictions so incessantly shocked. 
He is not compelled to dig through modern improvements to read 
the lines that move him so deeply. There they are, the very 
characters the centuries have writ. He sees the foot-prints of the 
mighty ages, and lays his hand on their mouldering • garments. 
As we passed over this mournful tract, every stone that lay in the 
sunshine seemed a history. We were on the Appian way, over 
which the Roman Legions had thundered so often, and in the very 
plain where the Sabines — the Volsci and others had in their 
turn striven to crush the infant empire. 

At length we entered the gates, rolled over the Celian hill and 
descended into the heart of modern Rome. 

The sensations one experiences in passing through the streets 
are odd enough. His feet are on a dead empire, and here an 
ancient obelisk and there a fountain or a ruin keep up the mys- 
tery and awe with which he first contemplated the city. But 
suddenly an object passes between him and that ruin — he looks, 
and it is a modern belle — a Roman, with her French hat, finery 
and bustle, rustling by. He rubs his eyes and looks again. It 
cannot be : for upon that proud marble front stands written in 
haughty characters, S. P. Q. R., " Senate and People of Rome." 
He turns ; the black-eyed Roman has tripped by, but right among 
those grim, old columns is a blacksmith quietly shoeing a Ro- 
man's horse. Thus you go on, one moment reminded of Csesar 
— the next of tobacco — one moment imagining the haughty form 
that once passed beneath that arch — the next seeing a beggar 
crouched in his rags beneath it. 

After I had become domiciled, the first object I sought was St. 
Peter's. Every body has written of St. Peter's, and every body 
says that the first view disappointed them — ^that the admirable pro- 



114 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

portion maintained throughput diminishes the greatness of the 
wkole. It was not so with me. Although in general every thing 
is under my anticipations, this was beyond them. 

As I stood in front of the noble area with the ancient obelisk 
rising in the centre, and the snow-white fountains sending up their 
foam against the fourfold colonnade that swept down in a semi- 
circle on either side to where I stood, surmounted by their one 
hundred and ninety-two statues, and looked up to the front of St. 
Peter's rising majestically from its noble flight of steps, I lifted up 
my hands in amazement. 

My astonishment w^as only increased as I ascended into the 
vestibule and entered the main body of the church. The rich 
marble floor — the lofty nave — the stupendous columns, and the 
wealth of statuary that leans out on every side, make it appear 
more like an artist's dream than an actual creation. 

You are lost in the amplitude around you, and the men and 
women that creep over the floor are mere insects amid the gi- 
gantic objects that stand on every side. At length, as you ap- 
proach the immense bronze canopy and gaze up into that solemn 
dome, circling av/ay into the heavens, you exclaim, "It is 
enough !" It seems as if Art had fallen in love with her own 
creation, and in the enthusiasm of her passion had thrown away 
all her wealth upon it. 

Truly yours. 



SATURDAY BEFORE EASTER. 115 



LETTER XXIV. 

Saturday before Easter and Easter Sunday. 

Rome, April, 1843. 

Dear E. — I will skip over the ceremonies of Holy week, and 
give you simply a brief sketch of Saturday before Easter Sun- 
day, and Easter Sunday itself. 

Saturday before Easter I gave up St. Peter's, as nearly the same 
thing was to be done over again, and went in the morning to St. 
John's, in Laterano, (as it is called,) one of the oldest and most 
magnificent churches of Rome. From its greater contiguity, it 
claims precedence of St. Peter's, and the feeling between the ri- 
val churches, is not of the most brotherly kind. St. John's being 
the mother church, ought to be the residence of the Pope ; but 
the conveniences and splendor of St. Peter's, correspond better 
with the tastes of his Holiness, and he you know is not a respon- 
sible being. The consequence is, that as soon as a pope dies, the 
College of Cardinals at St. John immediately assert their suprem- 
acy, by issuing new coin. 

But we will leave them to their quarrels for to-day. This 
morning is always devoted to the ordination of priests and the 
baptism of converts — such as Jews, Greeks, &c. Having heard 
that several Jews and Greeks were to be baptized, I went early 
to witness the ceremony. I was surprised to find the chui'ch so 
little crowded ; and after listening a short time to the chanting of 
the priests, I began to roam over the church. Still few people 
came, and I began to suspect there was something wrong ; so 
seeing a priest come out from a side chapel with a book under 
his arm, 1 accosted him. He told me that the ceremony was in 
the Baptistry, which is a separate building, erected by Constantine, 
and repaired by two popes. I immediately hastened to it, and 



116 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

descending to the interior, saw the entire circle around the fom, 
literally blocked with human beings who were patiently waiting 
the commencement of the imposing ceremony. Putting my foot 
on the plinth of one of the magnificent porphyry columns that sup- 
port the dome above the font, and throwing one arm around it, 1 
was enabled to get a bird's eye view of the whole. — After waiting 
a half hour or more, the bishops with the priestly procession en- 
tered. All were standing silent and intent, Vv^aiting the appear- 
ance of the Jews and Turks, &c., who were thus publicly to ab- 
jure their faith. The water in the font was blessed, and oil 
poured on it in the shape of a cross, and chantings uttered, but still 
no Turks appeared. At length a woman brought forward an in- 
fant, that seemed about three days old, and it was baptized. A 
second, that seemed its counterpart, was also brought to the bish- 
op and baptized. Still the crowd stood in breathless expectation 
for the commencement of the interesting ceremony that was to 
crown the whole ; but, alas ! the whole was finished, and the 
bishop with his train wheeled away. I never beheld such blank 
looks of astonishment as for a few moments surrounded that font. 
— Every face expressed in the most emphatic language, " is this 
all — can it he alL^' And then one would turn to another with 
such a look of earnest inquiry, as much as to say, " what do you 
think." Those who had mounted benches and chairs, to overlook 
the throng, stepped down with such a softly step and shamed 
look, as if afraid to be noticed, and one after another began to 
slink away so quietly, and the whole pageant had ended in such 
a ridiculous farce, that I involuntarily burst into a laugh. Yet it 
was not on account of the ceremony, but the people. — Many a one 
bad risen before her time of waking, and many a hurried break- 
fast taken, and many a scudi expended in carriages, and St. Pe- 
ter's given up with reluctance to witness the baptism of two very 
small infants. 

My friend and myself, after loitering around a while, and again 
seeing the poor creatures mounting " Scala Santa," on their knees, 
turned to walk home. St. John's, standing close by the gate that 
leads to Naples, it is a long walk from it to the centre of the city. 
We at first repented of our choice, for the sun was beating on 
our heads with terrific force ; but we were soon amply renaid ; 



EASTER SUNDAY. 117 



for this being the day whose evening saw the Son of God rise 
from the dead — it is filled with joyful celebrations. Yesterday, 
the Tenebrse and Miserere had been sung over the death and 
burial of the Savior ; but to-day, there was no mourning. The 
Miserere was over, and the Jubilate commenced. About midday, 
as we stood on the Quirinal, suddenly every bell of the city seemed 
unloosed in its tower, and swung, and shouted out its hallelujah. 
You cannot conceive the exciting effect of so many bells ringing 
at once in their gladdest notes. — The city seemed fairly to lift 
under it ; and suddenly from the far castle of St. Angelo, thun- 
dered forth the deep cannon, blending their sullen joy with the 
emulative bells, till the Sabine hills sent back the jubilee, and 
the sound came rolling down over the Quirinal, saying in wild, 
yet stirring accents, "Christ the Lord is risen to-day." As we 
M'alked along, from every corner guns were fired till the city 
shook again. Hovv^ever inappropriate the kind of joy, one could 
not feel indifferent to it. But after it had subsided av.^ay, and the 
city lapsed again into its usual quietness, it did seem strange 
enough. In viewing the pageantries and senseless ceremonies in 
honor of St. Peter, I have often wondered what the great Apostla 
would have said, had he foreseen it all ; so now I felt that our Sa- 
vior must have turned vv ith pity and disgust from such a celebra- 
tion of his resurrection. In St. Peter's on this day, the principal 
ceremonies are " blessin^y of the fire and incense " — the new lis^iU 
(quite different, however, from our new lights at home,) and the 
blessing of the paschal candle, which is large as a small column. 

Easter Sunday. This is the last great day of the Popish feast; 
and the Pope celebrates high mass in St. Peter's. This is done 
but three times in the year — this day — the festival of St. Peter 
and Paul — and Christmas. To-day also the Pope wears the Tiara 
or triple crown. It was first worn by Pope Sylvester, with a 
single coronet; Boniface Eighth, about the year 1300, added a 
second, and John the Second, or Urban Fifth — it is not certain 
which, added a third, making it a triple crown, representing the 
pontifical, imperial, and royal authority combined. 

At any early hour the streets were thronged with carria?ges, 
and Rome, turned out of doors poured itself towards St. Peter's. 
It is a mile or more from the main part of the city to the church ; 



118 LETTERS FROM ITALY 

and the principal street leading to it, presented two unbroken 
lines of carriages, one going and the other returning. If for a 
moment, you got a view of the street for some distance, it appeared 
like two currents of water, one bearing the multitude on, and the 
other returning without them. At length, the cardinals began to 
arrive. Carriage after carriage, to the number of 40 or 50, 
came clattering along with black horses, and crimson plumes, and 
gilded trappings, resembling any thing but a cortege of priests. — 
Each had its three gaily attired footmen ; and some seemed half 
covered with gold, even to the hubs of the wheels, which glittered 
with the precious metal. One after another, they dashed into 
the semicircular colonnade that goes up to the main church, and 
rolled through its columns, more like the grandees of court, 
(as they indeed are,) than humble worshippers crowding to the 
sanctuary of God. As the Pope entered the church, the entire 
chapter received him, and his procession ; and the choir struck 
up, " Tu es Petrus et super banc petram sedificabo ecclesiam 
meam,'' &c. Thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I build 
my church, &c. Along the whole immense nave were ranged 
in opposing files, leaving the middle pavement empty, the grena- 
diers, national troops and capitoline guards. — Between these in 
his chair borne upon men's shoulders and covered with a canopy, 
passed the Pope, the Peacock feathers nodding behind him. The 
soldiers received him kneeling, and as the choir paused in their 
*' Tu es Petrus," &c., the military stationed in the gallery at the 
end of the church, midway to the roof, filled their trumpets, and 
the great bell of the Cathedral rung out its acclamations to the 
'' two hundred and Jifty -seventh successor '^ of the great Apostle. 
I noticed the holy father kept his eyes shut as usual, while he 
was borne along in state ; but I did not feel much respect for his 
devotional aspect, for I had been told by an Italian that the old 
man was compelled to close his eyes, as the motion of the chair 
made him seasick. Alas, that greatness must have the same 
stomach as ordinary men. 

I will not weary you with a detailed description of the mass 
and communion, and other ceremonies of the day ; for it would 
simply be saying that his Holiness knelt on a crimson and gold 
cushion — that now he laid aside, or rather had laid aside, his 



EASTER SUNDAY. 119 



tiara, and put on his mit 'e, and now vice versa — that there \ver3 
benedictions, and genuflections, and chantings, and incensings, 
and nonsensings of every sort. I loitered it out till the time of 
giving the benediction, when I pressed through the crowd and 
threaded my way to the top of one of the colonnades, to witness 
the imposing ceremony. To imagine it well, you must place be- 
fore you a magnificent church, with the paved ground gently 
sloping up to the flight of steps that lead into it. From each cor- 
ner imagine an open colonnade running down in a semicircular 
form, enclosing a vast area, and you have the front of St. Peter's. 
The centre of the area was kept clear by the military, ranged 
round it in the form of a hdlow square. Between the upper file 
of soldiers and the church steps, stood the living mass that waited 
the benediction. Behind the lower file were crowded the count- 
less carriages. The open colonnades, and the top of one of them, 
are given to strangers. In the front of the church, over the main 
entrance, there is a gallery, covered with a crimson cloth and 
shaded by an immense piece of canvass. Into this gallery the 
Pope advances, and blesses the people. 

Standing on the top of a colonnade, leaning against the base of 
a statue, I had a complete view of the whole. It was a grand 
spectacle, and I contemplated it with mingled feelings. The 
Pope had not yet made his appearance — and indeed I almost for- 
got him. It was both a pageant and a farce, combining all the 
magnificence that dazzles the crowd, and all the folly that " makes 
the angels weep." 

Nearly under me were a group of pilgrims, ragged and dirty, 
lying along the steps, unconscious of all around — their staves 
leaning across them, their head on their hand, and they either 
nodding or fast asleep. One boy held my attention for a long 
time. He lay on the hard stone, in deep slumber, with his fathei 
asleep beside him. Suddenly there was the blast of a trumpet, 
and the father started from his repose, and, supposing the Pope 
was about to appear, roused up his boy, so that they might not 
lose the invaluable blessing. The tired, ragged little fellow rose 
half up, and then fell back again heavily on the steps, sound 
asleep. The Pope did not appear, and the father, too, was soon 
in deep slumber beside his boy. What were their dreams, in the 



120 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

midst of this pomp and splendor? Tliey had wandered far from 
their quiet home, to receive the blessing of the Holy Father. 
Reckless of the magnificence around them — of the crowd — the 
ocean-like murmur that went up to heaven — they had fallen 
asleep under the shadow of St. Peter's. That boy, ragged and 
dirty as he was, had also his dreams, and his palace and objects 
of ambition ; but they were all far away, and many a weary mile 
must be traversed before he would be amid them again. What 
a change, to be waked from that quiet dream by the sound of 
trumpets, and instead of his own rude hut by the mountain stream, 
to find the lofty cathedral before him, and the rumor of thousands 
around him. ! 

At length the Pope appeared — engaged in a short prayer — 
stretched out his hands over the multitude that sunk to the earth, — 
and pronounced the benediction. The long lines of soldiers 
kneeled in their ranks, and all was silent as the grave. But the 
last word was scarcely spoken, before they were on their feet — 
drum and trumpet pealed out their joy — ^the cannon of St. An- 
gelo answered them, and the bells threw in their clang to swell 
the jubilee — the m.ultitude began to sway and toss and disperse — ■ 
and all v/as over. The people had been blessed, but their condi- 
tion had not been bettered ; and I thought of what a vetturino 
whom I once engaged said to me — " The people," said he, " are 
taxed so that they cannot live, and all the country is filled with 
misery and poverty, and all the return they get from the Pope is 
his benediction once a year. Ah," he added, with a scorn it was 
well his Holiness did not see, " non e un benedizione e un male- 
dizione ;" " it is not a benediction, but a malediction. '^ 

There could not have been less, I think, than 40,000 people 
assembled. After all the ceremony is over, you can walk, if you 
will, through St. Peter's and view its magnificence. On one side 
is arranged a row of temporary confessionals, with a placard over 
each, in every language in the civilized world. There the Arab, 
Russian, German, Greek. Swede, Spaniard and Englishman, can 
confess his sins in his own tongue, and receive absolution. Poor 
wretches are laieeling before them, pouring the tale of their sor- 
rows and sins into the ears of the yawning confessor, v/ho dis- 
misses them, one after another, with lightened consciences, though 



EASTER SUNDAY. 121 



not with purer hearts. At sun-down, if not too tired, you can 
return and stroll over the marble pavement, and listen to the ves- 
pers that, chanted in a side chapel, come stealing sweetly out into 
the amplitude, and float away among the arches in ravishing 
melody. The lamps are burning dimly before the altar — ^twilight 
is deepening over the glorious structure, and forms in strange 
costumes are slowly passing and repassing over the tesselated 
floor. The heart becomes subdued under the influence of sight, 
and sound, and a feeling almost of superstition will creep over 
the sternest heart. The gloom grows deeper, leaving nothing 
iistinctly seen, while that vesper hymn steals forth on the bewil- 
lered ear, like a strain from the unseen world. 

Truly yours. 



122 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXV. 

Illumination of St. Peter's — The Girandola. 

Rome, April, 1343. 
Dear E. — I was too weary to give you in my last a descrip- 
tion of the closing up of Easter Sunday. It is a principle in all 
Catholic ceremonies, never to wind off gradually, as is too fre- 
quently the case among Protestants, but to have the last display 
the most magnificent of all. Thus on Easter Sunday, the clo- 
sing up of Holy Week, the Papal throne crowds its entire 
pomp into its ceremonies, and as, during the day, the interior of 
St. Peter's has done its utmost to magnify his Holiness, so at 
night the exterior must do its share of glorification. This great 
building, covering several acres, is illuminated in its entire outer 
surface. It is an operation of great expense, and attended with 
much danger. It is caused by suspending four tliousand four, 
hundred lanterns upon it, covering it from the dome down. To 
accomplish ihis, men have to be let down with ropes, over every 
•part of the edifice, and left dangling there for more than an hour. 
Even from the base of the church they look like insects creeping 
over the surface. Hanging down the precipitous sides of the im- 
m^ense dome, standing four hundred feet high in the air, is attend- 
ed with so much danger, that the eighty men employed in it al- 
ways receive extreme unction before they attempt it. The last 
sacrament is taken, and their accounts settled, both for this world 
and the next, so that death would not,' after all, be so great a 
calamity. The Pope must amuse the people, and glorify his 
reign, though he hazard human life in doing it. But he has the 
magnanimity to secure the sufferer from evil in the next world. 
If a rope break, and the man is crushed into a shapeless mass on 
the pavement below, his soul immediately ascends to one of the 
most favored seats in Paradise. Pie fell from God's church — ho 



ILLUMINATION OF ST. PETER'S. 123 

died in the attempt to illuminate it, and in obedience to God's 
vicegerent on earth. How can the man help being saved ? But 
to make assurance doubly sure, the Pope gives him a passport 
with his own hand, which he declares St. Peter, who sits by the 
celestial gates, will most fully recognize. This is very kind of 
the Pope. If he kills a man, he sends him to heaven, and se- 
cures him a recompense in the next world for all he lost in this. 
The ignorant creature who is willing to undertake the perilous 
operation for the sake of a few dollars, wherewith to feed his 
children, believes it all, and fearlessly swings in mid heaven, 
where the yieldhig of a single strand of the rope would precip- 
itate him where the very form of humanity would be crushed out 
of him. 

But one forgets all this in looking at the illumination, which it 
is impossible to describe. There are two illuminations. The 
first is called the silver one, and commences about eight o'clock 
in the evening. These four thousand four hundred lamps are so 
arranged as to reveal the entire architecture of the building. 
Every column, cornice, frieze and window — all the details of the 
building, and the entire structure, are revealed in a soft, clear 
light, producing an effect indescribably pleasing, yet utterly be- 
wildering. It seems an immense alabaster building, lit from 
within. The long lines of light made by the columns, with the 
shadows between — the beautiful cornice glittering over the dark- 
ness under it — the magnificent semicircular colonnades all inhe- 
rent with light, and every one of the hundred and ninety-two stat- 
ues along its top surmounted with a lamp, and the immense dome 
rising over all, like a mountain of molten silver, in the deep dark- 
ness around ; so completely delude the senses that one can think 
of nothing but a fairy fabric suddenly lighted and hung in mid 
heavens. This effect, however, is given only when one stands at 
a distance. The Pincian hill is the spot from which to view it. 
All around is buried in deep darkness, except that steadily shining 
glory. Not a sound is heard to break the stillness, and you gaze, 
and gaze, expecting every moment to see the beautiful vision fade. 
But it still shines calmly on. 

This illumination lasts from eight to nine, and just as the bell 
of the Cathedral strikes nine, sending its loud and solemn peal 



124 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

over the city, a thousand four hundred and seventy-five torches 
are suddenly kindled, beside the lanterns. The change is in- 
stantaneous and almost terrific. The air seems to waver to and 
fro in the sudden light — shape and form are lost for a moment, 
and the vision which just charmed your senses is melting and 
flowing together. The next moment, old St. Peter's again draws 
its burning outline against the black sky, and stands like a moun- 
tain of torches in the deep night, with a fiery cross burning at the 
top. How the glorious structure bums, yet unconsumed ! The 
flames wrap it in their fierce embrace, and yet not a single detail 
is lost in the conflagration. There is the noble facade in all its 
harmony, and'yet on fire. There are the immense colonnades 
wavering in the light, changed only in that they are now each a 
red marble shaft. The statues stand unharmed, and all fiery 
figures. The dome is a vast fire-ball in the darkness, yet its dis- 
tinct outline remains as clear as at the first. The whole mighty 
edifice is there, but built all of flame — columns, frieze, cornice, 
windows, towers, dome, cross — a temple of fire, perfect in every 
part, flashing, swaying, burning in mid heaven. The senses 
grow bewildered in gazing on its intense brilliancy, and the judg- 
ment pronounces it an optical illusion, unreal, fantastical. Yet 
the next moment it stands corrected — that is St. Peter's, flaming, 
unwasted in the murky heavens. Hour after hour it blazes on, 
and the last torch is yet unextinguished when the grey twilight 
3f morning opens in the east. This you say is a glorious spec- 
tacle ; yes, but it is on Sahiath evening — The successor of the 
apostle — the spiritual head of the church — the '•' vicegerent of 
God on earth has sanctified the Sabbath by this glorious illumina- 
tion in honor of the Son of God V' What a preposterous idea, 
what a magnificent folly ! And do you think the modem Roman 
is so complete a fool as to believe in the propriety and religion of 
all tliis ? By no means. He admires and enjoys the spectacle, 
then sneers when it is over. 

There are hundreds who go to witness it and retum to theii 
homes with dark and bitter thoughts in their bosoms. The pat- 
riot (for there are patriots still in Rome, mindful of her ancient 
glor}-), to sigh over his degenerate country — the poor and half- 
staiyed artisan (for there are many such in the imperial city), to 



THE GIRANDOLA. 125 



curse the wastefulness of his monarch and spiritual father, who 
in this costly amusement robbed hundreds of mouths of their daily 
bread. Could one look through the darkness that wraps Rome 
and beneath the calm surface that is presented to the eye, he 
would see rebellion enough were it once harmonized and concen- 
trated, to shake the papal throne into fragments on its ancient 
foundations. The flames around St. Peter's would be seen to be 
typical of the moral fires around the seat of Papacy. But the 
embrace of the latter would not be found so harmless as that of 
the other, and men would not gaze on it in such pleasing ecstacy, 
but with the dark forebodings of him who feels the first throb of 
a coming earthquake. The years do not move round in a tread- 
mill, but each pushes on its fellow, and all are tending to a cer- 
tain goal. They have their mission and God his designs, and he 
is stupid and blind who believes that man can always be deluded 
by the same follies. The age of interrogation has commenced. 
Men begin to ask questions in Rome as well as in America, and 
every one tells on the fate of papacy more than a thousand cannon 
shot. Physical force is powerless against such enemies, while 
pageantry and pomp only increase the clamor and discontent. 

How much more befitting the head of any church, however 
corrupt, or the monarch on any throne, however oppressive, to 
take the thousands of dollars spent in these two illuminationis and 
buy bread for the poor ! Were this done, the day of evil might 
be postponed ; for on the Pope's head would be rained the bless- 
ings of the poor, which under the government of heaven are 
always so powerful to avert evil. The money squandered on 
these illuminations would have poured joy through hearts that sel- 
dom feel its pulsations, and been a benediction that the poor 
would have understood and appreciated. To spread out one's 
empty hands over the multitude is an easy thing and accom- 
plishes nothing. But with those hands to fill thousands of hungry 
mouths, would accomplish much, and exhibit something of the 
paternal care of a "Father." 

But this does not close the ceremonies of Holy week. The 
Pope furnishes one more magnificent spectacle to his subjects 
and his flock. The next night after the grand illumination is the 
" Girandola," or fire -works of his Holiness, and we must say 



■26 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

that he does far better in getting up fire- works than relicrious cer- 
emonies This ''• Girandola'' does credit to his taste and skill. 
It is the closing act of the magnificent farce, and all Rome turns 
out to see it. About half way from the Corso— the Broadwav 
of Pvome — to St. Peter's, the famous marble bridge of Michael 
Angelo crosses the Tiber. The castle of St. Angelo, formerly the 
vast and magnificent tomb of Adrian, stands at the farther end. 
This castle is selected for the display of the fire- works. None of 
the spectators are permitted to cross the bridge, so that the Tiber 
flows between them and the exhibition. There is a large open 
area as you approach the bridge, capable of holding twenty or 
thirty thousand people, or perhaps more. In a portion of this, 
near the river, chairs are placed, to be let to strangers at two or 
four pauls apiece, according as one is able to make a good bargain. 
The windows of the neighboring houses that overlook the scene are 
engaged weeks beforehand. The ordinarj* price of a seat, or even 
of a good standing spot in one of these houses, is a scudi or dol- 
lar. Towards evening the immense crowd begin to move in the 
direction of St. Angelo, and soon the whole area, and every win- 
dow and house-top, is filled with human beings. About eight the 
exhibition commences. The first scene in the drama represents 
a vast Gothic cathedral. How tiiis is accomplished I cannot tell. 
Ever^'thing is buried in darkness, when suddenly, as if by the 
.ouch of an enchanter's wand, a noble (jothic cathedral of the 
size of the immense castle, stands in light and beaut}- before you. 
The arrangement of the silver-like lights is perfect, and as it 
shines on silent and still in the surrounding darkness, you can 
hardly believe it is not a beautiful vision. It disappears as sud- 
denly as it came, and for a moment utter darkness settles over 
the gloomy castle. Yet it is but for a moment. The next in- 
stant a sheet of flame bursts from the summit with a fuiy per- 
fectly appalling ; wiiite clouds of sulphureous smoke roll up the 
sky, accompanied with molten fragments and detonations that 
shake the veiy earth beneath you. It is the representation of a 
volcano in full eruption, and a most vivid one too. Amid the 
spouting fire, and murky smoke, and rising fragments, the cannon 
of the castle are discharged, out of sight, almost every second. 
Report follows report with stunning rapidity, and it seems for a 



THE GIRANDOLA. 127 



moment as if the solid structure would shake to pieces. At length 
the last throb of the volcano is heard, and suddenly from the base, 
and sides, and summit of the castle, start innumerable rockets, 
and serpents, and Roman candles, while revolving wheels are 
blazing on every side. The heavens are one arch of blazing 
meteors — the very Tiber flows in fire, while the light, falling on 
ten thousand upturned faces, presents a scene indescribably strange 
and bewildering. For a whole hour it is a constant blaze. The 
flashing meteors are crossing and recrossing in every direction — 
fiery messengers are traversing the sky overhead, and amid the 
Incessant whizzing, and crackling, and bursting, that is perfectly 
deafening, comes at intervals the booming of cannon. At length 
the pageant is over, and the gaping crowd surge back into the 
city. Lent is over — the last honors are done to God by his re- 
vealed representative on earth, and the Church stands acquitted 
of all neglect of proper observances. Is it asked again if the 
people are deceived by this magnificence ? • By no means. A 
stranger, an Italian, stood by me as I was gazing on the spectacle, 
and we soon fell into conversation. He was an intelligent man, 
and our topic was Italy. He spoke low but earnestly of the state 
of his country, and declared there were as much genius and mind 
in Italy now as ever, but they were not fostered. An imbecile, 
yet oppressive government monopolized all the wealth of the state, 
and expended it in just such follies as these, while genius starved 
and the poor died in want. I have never heard the poor Pope so 
berated in my own country. At the close of the representation 
of a volcano, I remarked that it resembled perdition. " Yes," 
said he with a most bitter sneer, " liell is in Rome nowaday s.^^ 
Had the Pope or one of his gens-d'armes heard it, he would have 
seen the inside of a prison before morning. I was exceedingly 
interested in him, for he was an intelligent and earnest man, and 
when I turned to go away I took him by the hand and bade him 
good bye, saying, another day is finished. " Yes," he replied, 
with the same withering sneer, " another day of our Master, an- 
nother day of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.'' I was per- 
fectly thunderstruck at the man's boldness. Such a satire on his 
Holiness and his mode of celebrating a holy day, in the midst of 
a crowd, startled me, and t trembled lest his imprudence shouM 



128 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

bring down on him the vengeance of papal power. But tht 
man's heart was evidently full of bitterness at the mockery and 
folly before him, while his comitry lay prostrate in the dust. 
" Addio," said he, as he shook my hand, and the next moment 
was lost in the crowd. Many a time have I thought of him since, 
and would give much to know his after histoiy. Perhaps he has 
before this suffered as a conspirator, and gone with the multitude 
of taose whose tongues his Holiness has silenced in prison or 
death. And yet the man was right. What a close to religioua 
ceremonies had these last two nights been ! Their moral effect 
on the people was like that of any fire-works, with the exception 
that the successor of the apostle had got up these and graced the 
Sabbath with the illumination, having provided beforehand for 
the breaking of a few necks, by administering the last sacrament 
to the poor creatures who climbed up St. Peter's. The sanctity 
and infallibility of the Spiritual Father are not so easy to believe 
in under the shadow of the papal throne, and it puzzle me pro- 
digiously to account for the conversions to Catholicism of English 
and Americans in Rome. How a man of ordinary sense and pen- 
etration can become a Romanist in Rome, is passing strange. 

But it is now late at nisjht — the noise and maornificence of the 
day are over. Rome is once more asleep, and the same moon 
that shone on the ancient capitol, looks mournfully down on the 
few columns that stand in the old Roman Forum. In the ancien* 
circus of Nero, all this religious pomp has been to-day. Around 
St. Peter's is now the gathering and the greatness — formerly it 
was around the Coliseum. But to-day the Coliseum has been 
forgotten ; no foot has sought its falling corridors. The gladiato- 
rial shows have been exchanged for popish ones ; and the Roman 
Eagle that flew over the old city, has been smitten down by the 
Cross, and Pagan Rome has become Christian Rome. What 
revolutions time effects ! His chariot wheels, as they roll along, 
drag down thrones and empires, and leave on their ruins a Chris- 
tian Emperor and a Christian government. They roll on, and 
Christianity is stretched in the dust, and its fragments lie 
scattered over the wreck of its /oe. They will still roll on, and 
another scene be displayed on the ruins of both, and more 



THE GIRANDOLA. 129 



glorious than either. Ruins are piled on ruins till history seenis 
but a record of overthrows. 

*' Such is the moral of all human tales. 
'Tis but the same rehearsal of the past : 
First freedom, and then glory — when that faily, 
Wealth, vice, corruption, barbarism at last, 
And history with all her volumes vast," 
Hath but one page. 



Affectionately yo irs. 



130 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXVI. 

Chanting of the Miserere. 

April. 

Dear E. — One of the most impressive ceremonies of Holy Week 
is the chanting of the Miserere. Music is everywhere in this 
land of passion and pleasure. It bursts on you from the palace 
and the hovel — out of every house and every vineyard, and seems 
a part of the atmosphere, and to have almost the power to remove 
the curse of despotism itself. 

But to know the full effect of song and scenery together, one 
must hear the chanting of the Miserere in the Sistine Chapel of 
St. Peter's. That the Pope should select the best singers of the 
world for this service is not strange, but that he should with these 
be able to produce the effect he does is singular. The night on 
which our Savior is supposed to have died is selected for this 
service. The Sistine Chapel is divided in two parts by a high 
railing, one half being given to the spectators, and the other half 
reserved for the Pope, his cardinals and the choir. The whole is 
dimly lighted, to correspond with the gloom of the scene shadowed 
forth. This dim twilight falling over the motionless foi'ms of 
priest and monk and cardinals, and the lofty frescoed arches, to- 
gether with the awful silence that seemed hanging like a pall 
over all the scene, heightened inconceivably the effect to me. 

The ceremonies commenced with the chanting of the Lamen- 
tations. Thirteen candles, in the form of an erect triangle, were 
lighted up in the beginning, representing the different moral lights 
of the ancient church of Israel. One after another was extin- 
guished as the chant proceeded, until the last and brightest one 
at the top, representing Christ, was put out. As they one by one 
slowly disappeared in the deepening gloom, a blacker night 
seemef? ^atherinii over the hopes and fate o^man, and the lamen- 



CHANTING OF THE MISERERE. 131 

tation grew wilder and deeper. But as the Prophet of prophets, 
the Light, the Hope of the world, disappeared, the lament sud 
denly ceased. Not a sound was heard amid the deepening gloom. 
Tne catastrophe was too awful, and the shock too great to admit 
of speech. He who had been pouring his sorrowful notes over 
the departure of the good and great seemed struck suddenly dumb 
at this greatest wo. Stunned and stupified, he could not contem 
plate the mighty disaster. I never felt a heavier pressure on my 
heart than at this moment. The chapel was packed in every inch 
of it, even out of the door far back into the ample hall, and yet not 
a sound was heard. I could hear the breathing of the mighty mul- 
titude, and amid it the suppressed half-drawn sigh. Like the chant. 
er, each man seemed to say, " Christ is gone, we are orphans- — all 
orphans !" The silence at length became too painful. I thought 
I should shriek out in agony, when suddenly a low wail, so deso- 
late and yet so sweet, so despairing and yet so tender, like the last 
strain of a broken heart, stole slowly out from the distant darkness 
and swelled over the throng, that the tears rushed unbidden to my 
eyes, and I could have wept like a child in sympathy. It then 
died away as if the grief were too great for the strain. Fainter, 
and fainter, like the dying tone of a lute, it sunk away as if the 
last sigh of sorrow was ended, when suddenly there burst through 
the arches a cry so piercing and shrill that it seemed not the voice 
of song, but the language of a wounded and dying heart in its last 
agonizing throb. The multitude swayed to it like the forest to 
the blast. Again it ceased, and the broken sobs of exhausted 
grief alone were heard. In a moment the whole choir joined their 
lament and seemed to weep with the weeper. After a few notes 
they paused again, and that sweet, melancholy voice mourned on 
alone. Its note is still in my ear. I wanted to see the singer. 
It seemed as if such sounds could come from nothing but a broken 
heart. Oh ! how unlike the joyful, the triumphant anthem that 
swept through the same chapel on the morning that symbolized 
the resurrection. 

There is a story told of this Miserere, for the truth of which 
I can only refer to rumor. It is said that the Emperor of Aus- 
tria sent to the Pope for a copy of the music, so that he could 
have it performed in his own cathedral. It was sent, as requested, 



132 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

but the effect of the performance was so indifferent that the empe- 
ror, suspected a spurious copy had been imposed on him, and he 
wrote to his Holiness, intimating as much, and hinting also that 
he would fmd it for his interest to send him a true copy. The 
Pope wrote back that the music he had sent him was a genuine 
copy of the original, but that the little effect produced by it was 
owing to the want of the scenery, circumstances, &c., under 
which it was performed in St. Peter's. It may be so. The 
singer, too, is doubtless more than half. The power of a single 
voice is often wonderful. I remember an instance of this on 
Easter Sunday, as the procession was moving up and down the 
ample nave of St. Peter's, carrying the Pope on their shoulders 
as they marched. In the procession was a fat, stout monk, from 
the north of Italy, who sung the bass to the chant with which the 
choir heralded the approach of his Holiness. A band of per- 
formers stationed in a balcony at the farther end of the church 
was in full blast at the time, yet over it, and over the clioir^ and 
up through the heaven-seeking dome, that single voice swelled 
clear and distinct as if sinn-in^r alone. It filied that immense 
building, through which were scattered nearly thirty thousand 
people, as easily as a common voice would fill an ordinary room. 

No where is music so spontaneous and voluntary as in Italy, 
and no where is it studied with such untiring and protracted ef- 
fort. We might except the Germans here, who, perhaps, are as 
great composers as the Italians. But there is no song in the stern 
old Saxon heart. The sudden and exciting transitions of music 
are not found in their character. The free and fountain-like 
gushings forth of feeling in an Italian render him peculiarly fitted 
to enjoy and utter music, though we think this very trait in his 
character was formed in the first place by music. They have 
reacted on each other, making both the Italian and his music 
what they are. 

It is a singular fact that the best singers of Italy come from 
the northern provinces. The people of the south are more fiery 
and passionate, yet less distinguished for music, than those of the 
north. Nothing strikes the traveller in Italy with more force, or 
lives in his memory longer, than the gay street singing of the 
lower classes, yet one hears little of this io Rome or Naples. 



CHARTING OF THE MISERERE. 133 

There is a sombre aspect on old Rome, taken from its silent 
haughty ruins, giving apparently a coloring to the feelings of the 
people. The gay, lighted-hearted Neapolitan seems too gay for 
music — ^like the French, his spirits burst out in action. The 
Piedmontese are forever singing, while Genoa is the only Italian 
city over which the memory lingers ev3r fresh and ever delighted. 
There is not a moonlight night in which its old palaces do not 
ring with the song of the strolling sailor-boy or idle lounger. 
The rattling of wheels seldom disturbs the quietness of the 
streets, while the lofty walls of the palaces confine and prolong 
the sound like the roof of a cavern. The narrow winding pas- 
sages now shut in the song till only a faint and distant echo is 
caught, and now let it forth in a full volume of sound, ever 
changing like the hues of feeling. Hours and hours have I 
lain awake, listening to these thoughtless serenaders, who seemed 
singing solely because the night was beautiful. You will often 
hear voices of such singular power and melody ringing through 
the clear atmosphere that you imagine some professional musi- 
cians are out on a serenade to a " fayre ladye." But when the 
group emerges into the moonlight, you see only three or four 
coarse-clad creatures, evidently from the very lowest class, 
sauntering along, arm in arm, singing solely because they prefer 
it to talking. And, what is still more singular, you never see 
three persons, not even loys, thus singing together, without car- 
rying along three parts. The common and favorite mode is for 
two to take two different parts, while the third, at the close of 
every strain, throws in a deep bass chorus. You will often hear 
snatches from the most beautiful operas chanted along the streets 
by those from whom you would expect nothing but obscene songs. 
This spontaneous street singing charms one more than the stirring 
music of a full orchestra. It is the poetry of the land — one of its 
characteristic features — living in the memory years after every 
thing else has faded. I like, also, those much abused hand- 
organs, of every description, greeting you at every turn. They 
are the operas of the lazzaroni and children, and help to fill up 
the picture. Passing once through a principal business street of 
Genoa, I heard at a distance a fine, yet clear and powerful, 
voice that at once attracted our attention. On approaching I 



134 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

found it proceeded from a little blind boy not over eight years of 
age. He sat on the stone pavement, with his back against an old 
palace, pouring forth song after song v.'iih astonishing strength 
and melody. As I threw him his penny, I could not help fan- 
cvinor how he would look sittinor in Broadwav, with his back to 
the Astor House, and attempting to throw his clear, sweet voice 
over the rattling of omnibuses and carriages that keep even tlie 
earth in a constant tiemor. 

Truly yours. 



FARMING IN THE PAPAL Sl'ATES. 135 



LETTER XXVII. 

System of Farming in the Papal States — SuiFering of the Peasantry. 

Rome, April. 
Dear E. — Though you are not much of a farmer, perhaps the 
farming system, as it works in the States of his Holiness, may 
not be uninteresting. The Mezzaria system, or letting the farm 
upon shares, is the old and universal custom, both in the Papal 
States and in Tuscany. The landlord furnishes the necessary 
capital, and the tenant all the agricultural instruments and labor. 
The seed is paid for jointly, and the entire gross produce divided 
equally. This partnership of the landlord and tenant works very 
well in Tuscany, but destructively in the dominions of the Church. 
This is owing to the want of encouragement to industry, and the 
oppressive action of the government. The mode of managing 
rich arable lands around the eternal city, would be considered 
rather odd in the New World. I am not now speaking of the 
system of small farms with poor landlords and poorer tenants, but 
of the mode of farming the large districts. The tract of land 
called the Maremma district, embracing the territory that lies on 
the sea betweeen Tuscany and Naples ; the low land around Fer- 
rara and Ravenna; and the Campagna around Rome itself, called 
by agriculturists the " Agro Romano," are all divided into im- 
mense farms, owned of course by a few wealthy men. Thus the 
whole Maremma district is owned by only one hundred and 
fifty farmers. So also in the Agro Romano, embracing 550,000 
acres, exists the same impolitic division. One of the farms, called 
the " Campo Marto," contains 20,000 acres, others 3,000, while 
there are none below 1,000. This whole territory is owned by 
forty-two or three landlords, called " Merc&nti di Campagna," 
(merchants of the country.) They constitute a privileged corpo- 
ration, under the protection of government. Each merchant rents 



136 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

several farmsj paying tax only for tliat portion under cultivation. 
These Mercanti are, of course, extremely wealthy. They never 
reside on their farms, but build for themselves palaces in Rome, 
where they live in unbounded luxury. Their counting-houses 
and clerks are also all in the city. The " fattore," as he is call- 
ed in Italian, or steward, resides with a few herdsmen in the sol- 
iiary Casale — the only occupants of the immense plain. It re- 
quires a capital of 8100,000 to manage one of the largest of these 
farms, and the smallest require 810,000.* The rent of the Carnpo 
Marto alone is 825.000 a year. The Mezzaria system, as I re- 
marked, prevails almost universally, although, in some parts, leases 
or fixed rents are common. This is where the large farms are let 
to individuals, who immediately subdivide them into smaller ones, 
and rent them to men of smaller capital. 

These immense half barren tracts are as lonely looking as our 
western prairies ; nay, more so, for the dilapidated form of some 
old ruin rising on the view, tells you that it was not always so — 
that once, glorious structures adorned that plain, and the hum of a 
busy population was heard on its surface. I have seldom seen a 
more lonely spectacle than the rude mud huts, shaped like a bee- 
hive, of the herdsmen, standing here and there on the unfenced 
plain, while the stewards, alone or with keepers dressed in their 
shaggy sheep-skin coat, with pike in hand, were galloping amid 
the herds on their half wild horses. They look more like x^rabs 
than peaceful farmers. This system of grazing is practised only 
in the winter, when on the Campagna alone are collected more 
than half a million sheep, and three or four hundred thousand of 
tlie large grey Roman oxen. In the summer, these plains become 
too hot and unhealthy for the herds, and they are driven off to the 
mountains, to graze on the green pastures of the Sabian hills and 
the high grounds around the city, where they feed in safety till 
the season of malaria is past. But the horses on which the herds- 
men ride, are turned loose among the morasses, to take care of 
themselves. They feed with perfect impunit}^ on the unhealthiest 
tracts. I have seen them almost to their backs in swamps, feed, 
ing with the half wild bufialoes and swine, that are equally im- 
pervious to the climate. In this savage state they run about till 
» Vid. Murray. 



SUFFERING OF THE PEASANTRY. 137 

autumn, when they are again caught, rode over the Campagna, fit 
companions for their wild-looking riders. The crops are raised 
during summer, when the herds are among the hills; and the har 
vest is gathered in by the mountaineers, who dwell on the Volscian 
hills and the more elevated land towards the frontier of Naples. 
At this time the heat is intense, and would make even the slave 
of a cotton plantation wince. The poor peasantry, who have 
been accustomed from their infancy to the fresh mountain breezes 
and clear running streams of their native home, lured by the 
prospect of gaining a few pauls to support their families during the 
approaching winter, descend into the plains, to gather in the harvest. 
Then the slaughter commences, and does not end till harvest is 
over, and often not even then. The malaria seizes the hardy moun- 
taineer as its lawful prey, and hurries him with fearful rapidity 
into the grave. Unaccustomed to the scorching sun that beats on 
these plains, he finds himself at night exhausted and feeble. In- 
ured to toil, and delving among his native hills from morning till 
night, he wonders at his weariness. Without a hut to shelter him, 
he flings his complaining limbs on the damp earth, as he has 
often flung them on the mountain side, expecting the morning will 
find him fresh and vigorous as ever. But ere slumber has wrap- 
ped his weary form, the pestilential vapors begin to steam up from 
the noxious earth, and noiselessly embrace their unconscious vic- 
tim. In the morning, he who has felt all his life long his blood 
leap in his veins like his native torrents, now feels it creeping 
heavy and hot through his depressed system. Ignorant of his 
danger, or the cause of his ills, he renews his task, and again 
staggers on under a burning sun, and lies down again to sleep on 
the moist earth, in the embrace of his foe. The next day the poor 
fellow toils with hotter brain and a wilder pulse, and flings himself 
at night on the cool earth, from which he will never rise again tc 
his labor. Thus, while the scanty harvest of grain is gathered 
in, the malaria has been reaping its richer harvest of men. No! 
scores and fifties, but hundreds are thus left every summer on the 
Roman Campagna, while the wives and children they hoped tf 
feed by their industry, look in vain from their mountain homes foi 
their coming, and turn to meet the winter with blasted hopes 
Oh, Yhat haggard faces, miserable forms, have I seen peep o» 



138 LETTERS FROM ITALY 

from the low mud huts on the outsldrts of this desolate region. 
Many that have dragged out the harvest season, come to the 
frontier hoping to recover ; but the seeds of death are too deeply 
implanted, and they slowly waste away. In the more cultivated 
parts, grass and grain are grown alternately on the same land ; 
but here on the Campagna, they raise only one crop of grain in 
four years ; the intermediate time it is left for grazing. 

What a contrast this country presents to its former greatness, 
and to my own land. When the Caesars owned these palace and 
temple-covered plains, and their haughty legions thundered over 
them — who would have believed that the time would ever come 
when nought but a few solitary herdsmen would gallop across 
them ; or, stranger still, that a then unbroken forest, beyond the 
unknown ocean, would be a fruitful field, and its crowded popu- 
lation look with pity on Roman desolation. The mightiest em- 
pire the world ever saw, and an untrod forest, stood on the same 
earth together. The mighty empire has become a desolate prov- 
.nee, while the wilderness has become greater than an empire. 
Rome, the mistress of the world, rules now a territory less than 
the state of New York. The eagle that soared over the imperial 
city, has lefl it and her battling armies, and now sails with our 
commerce. Men flock to her to see fading glory — to our shores 
to behold rising glory. Not merely the " schoolmaster" but the 
merchant •' is abroad," laying his hand on objects and places, the 
poet and scholar have long considered holy. Institutions and 
structures honored by time and great names are no longer sacred 
to him. The scholar may complain and the enthusiast weep, it 
matters not, the spirit and power are abroad, and there is no 
resisting either. The old Roman Forum is turned into a rope- 
walk to make ropes and cordage for commerce, and the Baths of 
Diocletian into a cotton mill. 

Truly yours. 



THE COLISEUM AT MIDNIGHT. 139 



, LETTER XXVIII. 

The Coliseum at Midnight. 

Rome, April. 
Deir E. — Last night was a beautiful clear night, and "the 
full round moon" seemed sailing the heavens on purpose to see 
how mysterious and solemn a light she could throw over the ruins 
of ancient Rome. Byron says the Coliseum should always be 
seen by moonlighl, as the glare of day is too strong for it. So 
acting under his advice I sallied forth at midnight to visit it. It 
is at least a mile or a mile and a half from the centre of the city, 
and the dark and deserted streets and Trajan's lonely column that 
stood in the way, naturally put me in the mood to enjoy a ramble 
through it. I passed through the ruins of the Basilica of Con- 
stantine, climbed over its fallen columns, and finally emerged into 
the open moonlight right before the Coliseum. Its high and uneven 
top stood against the blue sky, with the pale and yellow light fall- 
ing all over it, while the arches opened like caverns beneath, and 
the clambering ivy glistened and rustled in the passing night 
wind. Here, said I to myself, one can for once romance and 
dream with nothing but the moonlight and the Coliseum to criti- 
cise him. But alas, my expectations were soon blasted, for to 
my surprise, as I approached, I saw a long line of carriages 
drawn up under the arches. Other people knew the Coliseum 
looked well by moonlight beside myself. I was half inclined to 
turn back, but finally concluded to enjoy it another way — by 
seeing how the fashionable world took such a scene. After 
groping through one of the arches, by which a carriage stood, 
with the driver fast asleep on the box, I stepped into the arena 
and looked around me. Arch above arch, seat above seat, arose 
that vast amphitheatre, and the ruined corridors, black cavernous 
arches, the rustlmg ivy, the mysterious grandeur of the whole, 



14J0 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

and the sudden rush of centuries over the weak and staggering 
memory, completely swept every thing but the past from my 
vision. I felt afraid where I stood — I could not wholly grasp the 
scene — I seemed amid something awful, and yet could hardly tell 
what. I turned, and lo ! I was leaning over the lion's den. I 
started, as if a sudden roar had burst up around me. The next 
moment it was all gone. The quiet moon was sailing along the 
quiet sky — the night breeze sighed mournfully by, and nature 
was breathing long and peacefully. 

A gay laugh dispersed the whole, as a fashionable couple 
passed near me, speaking of some one's grand soiree. I wander, 
ed around, meeting groups of sauntering idlers, talking French, 
Italian and German. A French couple promenaded backward 
and forward across the arena, without once looking up to the 
moonlit ruin. They spoke low and earnestly, and their walk 
was of that slow and steady pace which always denotes an ab- 
sorbed mind. I stood for a long while in the shadow of the ruins 
and watched them. It was a love scene in the Coliseum, but the 
Coliseum itself was quite forgotten. The voice of one man 
thrilled deeper in that fair one's heart than the thousand-tongued 
ruin around her. Her heart was busy amid other scenes. Un- 
der its magic power the Coliseum was buried and Rome for- 
gotten, and a fabric more beautiful than both, in their glory was 
reared above them — a fairy fabric where love dwelt and fate spun 
her golden thread. Alas, I sighed, as I turned away, there are 
more ruins in the world than the Coliseum, and more awful. 
The saddest fragments are not those that meet the eye, and the 
light that memory flings over buried hopes, is lonelier than moon- 
light here. 

This second dream was also dispelled by a shout above me : a 
company, guided by a man with a torch, now emerged in view 
overhead, and again dropped through the corridors. Suddenly 
a French girl near me exclaimed, as they again came on to an 
arch and stood looking down upon us, " C'est tres joli ?" "Oui," 
was the answer. *' C'est magnifique," and then a laugh as clear 
and mirthful as ever rung from a careless heart. I wished also 
to ascend the ruin for the view, but kept deferring it, as it was 
necessary to have a guide and torch to prevent one from ver.tur 



THE COLISEUM AT MIDNIGHT. 141 

ing over weak arches and tumbling down ruined flights of steps. 
It was abominable to be compelled to trot around after a sleepy 
guide who was thinking the while of the paul each was to give 
nim. It seemed downright sacrilege, but I must do it, or not go 
at all. So I joined a mixed party of ladies and gentlemen and 
commenced the ascent just as one does an unpleasant duty. I 
followed doggedly the guide and torch awhile, when, seizing a 
favorable opportunity, I dodged one side, threaded my way amid 
the darkness to the top of the building, and clambering over a 
mined parapet lay down, determined to take my own time to 
view the Coliseum. The humdrum guide did not miss me, and 
1 was left alone with the Coliseum and the night. One by one 
the groups retired, and I heard with joy the last carriage rattle 
away toward the city. Behind me stood the arch of Constan- 
tine^-on my left was the Palatine hill, the Roman forum with its 
few remaining columns and the Capitol, and beneath me was the 
arena where thousands had been " butchered to make a Roman 
holiday." Up those very stone steps below me had passed hasty 
feet more than a thousand years ago. Right around me had 
been the bustle and hum of the eager assembly. Before me, 
through that grand archway in which now the bayonet of a 
solitary sentinel glistened, had passed the triumphal Caesars 
while the mighty edifice rocked to the shout of the people 
Beneath me, far down in the arena, on which the moonlight lay 
so peacefully, had stood the gladiator while his quick ear caught 
the roar of the lion, aroused for the conflict. " Hie habet," had 
been shouted from where I lay, as the steel entered some poor 
fellow's bosom. There the dying gladiator had lain as the life 
stream ebbed slowly away, while his thoughts, far from the scene 
of strife, reckless who Was the victor, were 

" Where his rude hut by the Danube lay — 
There were his young barbarians all at play, 
There was their Dacian mother." 

Oh, what wild heart-breakings had been in that arena ! Every 
inch of it had been soaked in blood, and yet not a stain was left 
—not a scar remained to4ell of the death-struggles these walla 
had witnessed. The Caesars and the people, the slave and the 
martyred Christian, bad all passed away* The spot Mvhere the 



142 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

one looked and the other suffered alone was left. — Thought crowded 
on thought as I looked down upon it, till the solitude and silence 
became too painful for me. I seemed to have lived years in those 
few minutes. I turned to descend, but alas, I was without a guide 
or a torch, locked up on the Coliseum after midnight. To thread 
my way through the dark galleries and down the broken steps, 
was no easy task ; but after going and returning, mounting and 
descending for near a quarter of an hour, (and which seemed an 
hour,) I found the way, and landed safely at the entrance. After 
some thumping, the guide came and set me free. 

I returned through the Basilica of Constantino, and while standing 
and musing over one of its fallen columns, I suddenly heard the 
scream of a night bird which came from the Palatine hill, and was 
echoed back by another from near the Capitol. I had never heard 
it then, though I often have since. It was a shrill, single cry, that, 
heard amid those ruins at midnight, was indescribably thrilling. — 
Right above me, on a ruined front, leaned several marble statues, 
in attitudes so natural, that it was almost impossible to believe they 
were not human beings keeping watch among the ruins. Just 
then the wind began to sweep by in gusts, shaking the ivy over 
my head, while the wild, mournful cry of that night bird seemed 
like the wail of a ghost amid the surrounding desolation. The 
hour, the place, and the silence, made it too lonely. It was fear- 
ful. I would stand and listen, anxious, yet afraid to hear it re- 
peated, and when again it rung over the ruins, it sent the blood 
back with a quicker flow to my heart. I passed under the great 
arch, and began to enter the city, feeling as if I had heard the 
ghost of Rome crying out amid her ancient ruins. But I know 
all description must seem rhodomontade to you at this distance, 
yet to a heart that has not lost all worship for " the great and the 
old," it is widely different. The only good description I have 
ever seen, is in Byron's Manfred. It is much better than in Childe 
Harold. 

" I do remember me that in my youth 
When I was wandering ; upon such a night 
I stood within the Coliseum's wall 
'Midst the chief relics of Almighty R» me ; 
The trees which grew along the broken arches 
"Waxed dark in the blue midnight, and the staw 



THE COLISEUM AT MIDNIGHT. 143 

Shone through the rents of ruin ; from afar 
The watch-dog bayed beyond the Tiber ; and 
More near from out the Caesars' palace came 
The owl's long cry, and interruptedly 
Of distant sentmel's the distant song 
Began and died upon the gentle wind. 
Some cypress beyond the time-worn beach 
Appeared to skirt the horizon, yet they stood 
Within a bow-shot where the Caesars dwelt. 

And thou didst shine, thou rollmg moon, upon 
All this, and cast a wide and tender light 
Which softened down the hoar austerity 
Of rugged desolation, and filled up, 
As 'twere anew, the gaps of centuries ; 
Leaving that beautiful which still was so, 
And making that which was not, till the place 
Became religion, and the heart ran o'er 
With eilent worship of the great and old ! 
The dead but sceptred sovereigns who still rul© 
Our spkits from their ruins." 

Tnilj fouifh 



144 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXIX. 

Ruins and Epitaphs in Rome. 

Rome, April, 1843. 

Dear. E.— To-day I have had a beautiful drive with an Eng. 
giish gentleman and his lady, vv^ithout the v/alls of Modern Rome, 
amid the ruins of Ancient Rome, for you know that the city for- 
merly covered an area of which the present occupies but a fraction. 
—With its declining splendor it contracted itself, till, from the mil- 
lions it was supposed formerly to contain, it nov/, suburbs and all, 
counts scarcely 150,000. To-day has seemed a little more like 
being in Rome. I have been away from the rattling of carriages — 
the passing crowd — and what is still worse, long rows of gaily dec- 
orated snops. I have wandered over Old Rome, and the shadows 
of its Caesars, Scipios, and haughty leaders, have risen around me. 

We first drove to the Temple of Vesta, which is now a Church 
— a small orbicular building, of Greek architecture, and sur- 
rounded by nineteen Corinthian columns of Parian marble. We 
then passed on to the tomb of Caius Cestus, which is built in the 
form of the Pyramid. Near by is the English Burial Ground. 
There I saw Shelley's tomb, a plain marble tablet only. On it is 
written : 

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.—* Cor Cordium.' 
« Nothing of him that doth fade, 
But doth suffer a sea-change 
Into sometliing rich and strange." 

Cor Cordium, " heart of hearts," is an allusion to the singular fact 
that when Byron and Hunt burned his body by the gulf of Spezia, 
his heart alone remained unconsumed. With all his scepticism, 
he was a kind-hearted man. His Italian teacher was mine at 
Genoa, and he told me that Shelley was a nobler man than either 
Byron or Hunt. In an adjoining cemetery sleeps John Keats. 



RUINS AND EPITAPHS IN ROME. 145 

A small marble slab, half hid amid the long grass, stands over 
the young poet. On it is written, " This grave contains all 
that was mortal of a young English poet, who, on his death-bed, 
in the bitterness of his heart, at the malicious power of his ene- 
mies, desired these words to be engraved on his tomb-stone : 
* Here lies one whose name was writ in water.' " Feb. 28, 1821. 
I stood alone over this solitary grave of genius and sighed. I have 
read of broken hearts, but nothing ever indicated to me half so 
lonely and desolate a heart, as the dying language of Keats. So 
utterly broken was his spirit, and so reckless his despair, that he 
wanted to record his own ruin, and have his very tomb-stone tell 
how worthless were his life and name. 

A strangely sensitive being he was, to feel so deeply an unjust 
criticism that a hired Reviewer could publish. 

Oh, can one envious tongue 
So blight and blast earth's holiest things, 
That e'en the glorious bard that sings, 

Grows mute — and all unstrung, 
His bleeding, quivering heart gives o'er, 
And dies without one effort more ? 

'Tis " writ," as thou hast said, 
Upon the cold gray marble there, 
Each word of that wild, bitter prayer, 

On which thy spirit fled ! 
But oh, that injured name is known, 
" Far as the birds of fame have flown." 

Yet thou hast said aright, 
Thy name is in the water writ, 
For tears are ever shed on it. 

Till dims the aching sight, 
By pilgrims from each distant land, 
Who, weeping, round thy grave-stone stand. 

1 plucked a flower that was drooping with rain-drops beside tho 
grave and turned away. 

From this we drove to the Basilica of St. Paul, formerly ond 
of the most magnificent churches of Rome. In 1829, on *he 
morning of the 16th of July, the whole roof was seen to be in 
flames, and very soon fell with a crash irto the centre aisles. 



J 46 LETTERS FRO^f ITALY. 

where the fire raged with such fur\' that it calcined the rich col 
unins of Parian marble near it, and indeed destroyed the great 
part of the Church. They are now rebuilding it, and some ot 
the fluted columns that escaped the fire, are the most beautiful 1 
have ever seen. It will again be a noble edifice. From this we 
drove to the far-famed fountain of Egeria. It is a grotto in the 
midst of a meadow all overhung with foliage. Withha the side 
walls are several niches ; and at the extremity, a reclining statue, 
old and mutilated, often called the statue of the nymph. But it 
L5 & male statue, and is doubtless that of a river god. Here (so 
runs the fable) the mortal and immortal used to sit and discourse 
of an earthly passion, and watch the moon and stars sailing 
through the nightly heavens. Numa and the nymph meeting 
t-eside this fountain by moonlight, and breathing into each other's 
earc language never repeated to mortals, are about all I remem- 
ber of Livy and his hard sentences. I care not whether the story 
be true or false. I agree with Byron — 

" Whatsoe'er thy birth, 

Thou vrert a beautiful thought aud softly bodied forth." 

Above it stands the Temple of Bacchus, and beyond crowning 
a hill, a dense grove of olives. A company of English ladies 
stood on the green mound in front of the temple, while groups 
v.ere strolling around in the bright meadow gathering flowers. It 
was a scene of beauty. The bright blue sky, and the exhilara- 
ting air, and the fragrance of fields and flowei-s soon brought my 
spirits up to the enjoying point. 

The picturesque tomb of Cecilia Metella in ruins — the Circus 
of Romulus — ^the Catacombs of the old city, where martyrs sleep, 
followed in quick succession. Then the Tomb of the Scipios, 
'Jirough whose dark, damp and silent chambers we passed by 
candle light. Oh how strange over the empty sarcophagi to read 
in the mouldering stone, the name of Scipio, and the date of buri- 
al. I had stood on the solitary sea-shore, where Africanus sleeps, 
Rnd sighed over the fallen hero. — But here was a more familiar — 
a family scene ; and I almost started from the close proximity of 
the Past. I felt like one who had ventured too far, and was be. 
coming too familiar with awful things. 



RUINS AND EPITAPHS IN ROME. ^4\ 

We then passed Caracalla's Baths, the Palace of the Csesars, 
along the Appian Way, through the Sebastian Gate — passed by 
the Coliseum, under the Capitoline Hill, by the Roman Forum 
and its solemn ruins — entered the city by the ancient Via Fla 
minia, now the gay Corso, and ended the day of great remem- 
brances, as all days of toil must be ended, in a hearty dinner. 
Yet all night long I was wandering amid old Rome. Its mailed 
legions thundered along the Appian Way — Cicero, and Brutus, 
and Csesar, and Nero, and gladiatorial shows, and fierce battle 
scenes, danced through my excited brain in most glorious confu- 
»oc. 

Truly yours. 



148 LETTERS FROM ITALY 



LETTER XXX. 

The Capitol and Vatican. 

Rome, April 28, 1843. 

Deae E*-— =You may be surprised to find these two remarkable 
objects put in one letter, but I am going into no description of 
galleries. I wish to mention two or three things only in each. 
To-day I went to the Capitol, and after having traversed the 
length of the Corso I came to a noble flight of steps that brought 
me to the top of the Capitoline hill. The buildings on it were 
designed by Michael Angelo. They stand in the form of a parel- 
lelogram, with the main flight of steps at one end. At the bottom 
of the steps is the old Roman mile-stone that marked the first 
mile of the Appian way. At the top are two statues of Castor 
and Pollux standing beside their horses. — In the centre of the par- 
allelogram stands the bronze equestrian statue of Marcus Aure- 
lius, the only one that has been handed down from antiquity. It 
is considered the finest equestrian statue in existence. It was 
once covered with gold, and spots of the gilding still remain. 
The enthusiastic love of Michael Angelo for it is well known. 
When it stood in front of the Lateran, it was an important object 
amid the festivities that celebrated Rienzi's elevation to the rank 
of Tribune. Amid the rejoicings of that memorable day, wine 
was made to run out of one nostril and water out of the other. 

The building at the farther end is the " Palace of the Sena- 
tors." In the two side palaces are busts, statues, paintings, &c. 
— many of the deepest interest. Among others, the bronze wolf — 
" the thunder-stricken nurse of Rome" — about which so much 
has been written and so much controversy expended in vain. 
From all that can be gathered, it is doubtless the one to which 
Cicero more than once alluded. That wolf was once struck with 
lightning in the Capitol, and one leg of this has evidently been 
partly melted away in a similar manner, — Said Cicero, in one of 



THE CAPITOL AND VATICAN. 149 

his memorable attacks on Cataline, " Tactus est ille etiam qui 
banc urbem condidit Romulus quem inauratum in Capotolio par- 
vum atque lactantem, uberibus lupinis inhiantem fuisse meminis- 
tis." This, too, one of the objects of deepest reverence, had the 
Gods smitten, as an evidence of their anger. In the palace is the 
famous " dying gladiator." This is one of those few statues I 
was not disappointed in. As I looked upon that manly dying 
form, and caught the mingled expression of pain and sorrow on his 
noble face, I could scarcely refrain from tears. I am vexed at the 
discussions of antiquarians about this statue. I care not whether 
it be a fancy piece, or a slave, or a Gallic herald, or a dying 
gladiator. There he lies dying — dying from a wound a foe has 
given him — dying too, innocent. His whole expression tells of a 
man who fought from necessity, not will. There is no anger in 
it, but the reverse ; none of the fierce passions that kindle in the 
human face when foe meets foe. The whole countenance is be- 
yond expression mournful. The eye utters his despair, telling in 
thrilling accents that the last hope of life is given up — the slightly 
wrinkled brow and yielding lip speak his pain, while the clotted 
hair tells of the long and exhausting fight before he fell. Every 
limb of the noble form speaks of the terrible exertion it has put 
forth in the struggle for life. And then over all the face is that 
dreamy expression that shows the heart is far away amid other 
scenes. How natural he lies upon his arm, gradually sinking 
lower and lower, as the " big drops" ooze from the fountain of 
life ! I thought of Byron as I stood beside it, and of the intense 
feeling with which he gazed upon it. His stanzas are the most 
literally correct description ever written. He has hit every ex- 
pression of the figure, and when the " inhuman shout'' rung over 
the arena to his victor, you know 

" He heard it but he heeded not — his eyes 
Were with his heart, and that was far away ; 
He recked not of the life he lost nor prize, 
But where his rude hut by the Daunbe lay, 
There were his young barbarians all at play, 
There was their Dacian mother — he their sire, 
Butchered to make a Roman holiday — 
All this rushed with his blood." 

With one long stride step into the Vatican, as the papal palace. 



150 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

museum, &c., that join St. Peter's, are called. Here is Laocoon, 
that men have poetized, as well as the dying gladiator, and yet 
it pleases me not. I have a feeling of horror it is true in looking 
upon it, and that is all. I have no deep sympathy for Laocoon 
himself. Master critics have long ago settled the perfection of 
the work. There is life and force in it. The little child with 
one foot raised to press down the folds of the serpent that are 
tightening around the other leg, is terribly true and life-like. But 
the whole expression of Laocoon is that of a weak man, utterly 
overcome with terror — mastered more completely by fear than a 
strong-minded man ever can be. There seems no resistance left 
in him, and you feel that such a character never could die decent- 
ly. While I admired the work, I could not love Ihe character. 
On the gladiator's face such utter terror never could be written. 
The sights that could paint such fear on his features do not exist. 
I will not attempt to take you through the Vatican. This first 
time I roamed through it without guide-book or question. The 
Apollo Belvidere and Laocoon I could not mistake, neither aid I 
wish any one to tell me when I came to the Transfiguration. 
The glorious figure of Christ in this latter picture, suspended in 
mid heaven, and the wonderful face, so unlike all other faces ever 
painted before, held me spell-bound in its presence. Why couid 
not the artist have left out the some dozen or more saints that he 
has placed below, gaping with astonishment on the wondrous 
spectacle ? The two shining figures beside the still more ra- 
diant Savior are enough to complete the group. The addition 
of others destroys the simplicity, and hence injure the grandeur 
of the whole. It was foolish to attempt to improve on the original 
group. Yet I went away vexed and irritated. My utter in- 
ability to see half as it ought to be seen, prevented my enjoying 
any thing. Again and again I strolled through its immense halls, 
and can only say it is a forest of statuary, and ought to be di- 
vided among the world. But what shall I say of the Vatican ? 
How can I describe it ? I cannot — I can only say it is more than 
1,000 feet long, and nearly 800 wide — that it contains eight 
grand staircases, 200 smaller ones, 20 courts, and 4,422 apart- 
ments, and a library no one knows how large. 

Truly yours. 



THE POPE— DON MIGUEL. 151 



LETTER XXXI. 

The Pope — Don Miguel— Mezzofaiiti. 

Rome, April, 1843 
Dear E. — To-day I received an invitation to be presented to 
ais holiness the Pope, but as I found that ' shorts' and some other 
Inconvenient et ceteras were necessary I declined. I regretted it 
afterwards, as I found I could have been presented in my ordi- 
nary dress. Whenever ladies are presented, court dress is not 
required. A lady unexpectedly became one of the number who 
were to accompany our consul to his holiness, and I could have 
seen him without the inconvenience I anticipated. 

It was a matter of very little consequence, however, as I had 
on several occasions been within a few feet of him an hour at a 
time, and heard him speak, and got, as I supposed, a very good 
idea of the Man. He is nearly 80 years of age, but robust and 
healthy ; he stoops considerably and walks slowly ; yet when he 
mounts his throne his step is light and elastic as that of a youn^- 
man. He has marked aquiline features, a mild eye, and a very 
benignant countenance. He was a prelate of no distinction, and 
mounted to the chair of St. Peter as many others have done be- 
fore him, by party strife. As soon as the Pope dies there com- 
mences a furious struggle between the rival families for the 
throne. The only way the Cardinals can reconcile the factions, and 
escape from their imprisonment, often is to fall on some old and in- 
different Cardinal and elect him. The present Pope Gregory was 
elected under these circumstances. He is not regarded as a very 
clever man, although he bears an excellent moral character. 

I forgot to mention that the other day at some exercises in the 
Sistine Chapel, I saw Don Miguel. He is a very good-looking 
man He now lives at Albano, fifteen miles from Rome, whither 
Me has been banished by the Pope. While he was in power in 



loQ LETTERS FR031 ITALT 

Partugalj he lavished his wealth oa the Pope, who m)Wj in re- 
turn, sappoits him cm a salary, it is said, of $20,000. The cause 
of his hanishmeDt was an insult he ofiered to the wife of Prince 
Boighese, aae of the first &niilies in the Papal domink»s. She 
^as the dangfater of the Vinous Catholic Earl of Shrewsbuiy, 
and withtme English spirit, resented deeply the insult ol^red her. 
Boighese told his Holiness either Dcm Miguel must leave Rome, 
or he. The Pope, placed in this ddenuna, exiled Tkm Miguel fif- 
Xeea miles oflu to the beautiful hill of Albano, finxn whence he 
drives into town no ofi^ier dian he wishes. 

There is a singular custom here during Hcdy Week. Pilgrims 
from eveiy quarter journey oa. foot during Easter to RcHne, for 
which they are entertained at the Church of the '' Trinita" — their 
feet washed by distinguished ii^viduals, who also serve them at 
table, and finally put them nicely to bed. They are the cchu- 
pletest set of ragamu£mis you ever beheld, and it is really revolt- 
ing to loc^ at ibeir nasty feet. A few nights since D>yn Miguel 
attended in one of the convents attache i :: : ;h, and 

washed and served several of these lou5~ : r rr " : - t : " rrit 

IS attached to fliis act, and Tkm. Mig:: ^^ 

wadi out, in this way, some of his pecc3- - : f 

any quantity. The next night, srane t: : r : ^ :: t : t i 

into a carriage at St. Peter's, and rode i ; i. : : s t ? : r : i- 
ance. The pilgrims all sat in a row. on an eie- >: r :. 
vrjth each a wooden di^ under his feet. There is r_ / _ 

about this washing, as there is in the Pope's washicg : t i?;!- 
ples* feet. The dirt oa these beggars is, as Carlyle " uli s?.Tj 
well authenticated dirt, and it is no joke to remove it. Two Car- 
dinals were among the washers j and to my surp:: r ir : t" 1 : . 
I observed to be Cardhtal Messofanti, the greats- . 
world. He speaks fifty-two di^rent lang : ?i e- 

ments alone have obtained for him a Cardinal ; . : :.„i J : :. J:i 
iersTdp of RcMne. 

The Pope attributes his knowledge of languages to a miracu- 
lous gift. Conversing to-day with a piie^ on the subject — a 
friend of Mezzofenti — he told me that Mezzofenti himself attrib- 
utes his power in acquiring languages to the divine influence. 
He says that when an obscure priest in the North of Italy, he 



MEZZOFANTI. 153 



was called one day to confess two foreigners condemned for pi- 
racy who were to be executed next day. On entering their cell 
he found them unable to understand a word he uttered. Over- 
whelmed with the thought that the criminals should leave this 
world without the benefits of religion, he returned to his room 
resolved to acquire their language before morning. He accom- 
plished his task, and next day confessed them in their own tongue. 
From that time on, he says, he has had no difficulty in mastering 
the most difficult language. The purity of his motive in the first 
place, he thinks, influenced the Deity to assist him miraculously. 
A short time since a Swede, who could speak a patois peculiar to 
a certain province of Sweden, called on him, and addressed him 
m that dialect. Mezzofanti had never heard it before, and seemed 
very much interested. He invited him to call on him often, which 
he did, while the conversation invariably turned on this dialect. 
At length the Swede calling one day, heard himself, to his amaze- 
ment, addressed in this difficult patois. He inquired of the Car- 
dinal, who had been his master, for he thought, he said, there was 
no man in Rome who would speak that language but himself. 
" I have had no one," he replied, " but yourself — I never forget 
a zvord I hear once." If this be true, he has a miraculous mem- 
ory at all events. This the priest told me he had from Mezzo- 
fanti himself. At home this would be headed " Strange if true." 

I forgot to say, wiiile speaking of the ceremony of washing 
the pilgrims' feet, that there is a separate apartment in the same 
building for the females, and that princesses are some\ imes seen 
engaged in this menial office. Every one so washed receives a 
certificate of it, and if he wishes, a medal entitling him to heg. 

At the ceremony of washing there were several pilgrims that 
were mere boys, who seemed frightened enough at the sudden no- 
toriety they had acquired. One little fellow in particular at- 
tracted my notice. He was half frightened and half roguish ; 
and between the curious gaze of the spectators, the odd position he 
was in, and the Cardinal in his awful robes at his feet ; his coun- 
tenance had a half scared, half comic look, and his eye rolled 
from the Cardinal to the spectators, and back again in such queer 
bewilderment that it quite upset my gravity, and I indulged in one 
of Leather Stocking's long silent laughs. Truly yours. 



154 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXXII. 

New Mode of Selling Milk — Lake Tartarus— Adrian's Villa — Tivoli. 

TivoLi, April, 1843. 

Dear E. — This morning, for once at least, I was up before the 
sun. A gentleman who formerly held an appointment under our 
Government and finally married a wealthy Enghsh lady and spends 
his time in travelling, promised to call and take me in his carriage 
with him and his lady to Tivoli. Of course I was sure not to 
keep them waiting, hut was up betimes, and by means of it I 
made a remarkable discovery which I give for the exclusive bene- 
fit of New-Yorkers. 

IMorning after morning I had been awakened by a shrill signal 
whistle under my windows, and what it could mean at that 
early hour would always puzzle me till 1 fell asleep again. This 
morning as I opened the windows and stepped out upon the bal- 
cony (and by the way windows here are never made to raise, but 
to open like a double door), I was greeted by this same shrill 
whistle ringing directly beneath me. I looked down, and lo, it 
was the milkman's cry. A boy had driven to the door six or 
seven goats, and with his fingers in his mouth was whistling out the 
servant. In a few moments she appeared with her pint cup, which 
he took, and stepping up behind the goats milked it full, received 
his penny and drove on. Under a palace directly opposite I saw 
three cows standing in the same w'ay, the boy who drove them 
whistling away till the servant appeared, when he milked the 
measure full, and then passed on towards the Corso. This plan, 
you perceive, introduced into New-York, Avould effectually pre- 
vent watering the milk ; and give it always fresh and pure from 
the fountain-head. 

In a few minutes the carriage drove up, and under as bright a 
skv as ever bent over the Csesars ve rattled out of the city. We 



LAKE TARTARUS. 153 



passed San Lorenzo gate, and trotted along the " Via Tiburtina," 
crossed the Anio, and finally fetched up by the monument of 
" Giula Stemma." I will not describe it. At length the wails 
on either side of the way, built entirely of petrifactions, reminded 
us that we were in the vicinity of Lake Tartarus, " Lago di Tar- 
taro," the petrifying qualities of whose waters furnish the stone 
called travertine. Its sulphur stench was Tartarian enough, and 
at length it sparkled on our sight, a mere pond, in the midst of a 
large field. Petrifying its own borders, it has contracted its limits 
till it bids fair to petrify itself to death and become a stone lake» 
The rocks around it are all formed from moss and turf and masses 
of cane, whose tubes still remain in the stone. Remembering a 
certain brother of mine who has a perfect mania for odd speci- 
mens of this sort, and who had never failed in every letter to in- 
sinuate in no ambiguous language that he supposed I would " for- 
get to pick up some old stones " for him, I loaded down the car- 
riage with fragments of rock to my particular discomfort. 

Leaving this we came to the Solfatara (sulphur) canal. The 
odor from this stream, which drains the ancient Aqua Albulae, 
was still stronger than from Tartarus. This canal is nine feet 
broad, two feet deep, and two miles long, and the water that flows 
rapidly through it, almost of the color of milk. The Aqua Al- 
bulae is about a mile distant, and by its petrifying qualities has 
contracted itself from a mile in circumference to 500 feet. Near 
by are the Baths of Agrippa, patronized by Augustus and en- 
larged by Queen Zenobia, who was permitted to retire to Tivoli 
with her children, after she had graced the triumphal entry of the 
ravager of Palmyra into Rome. 

A little distance from the road stands the ruins of Adrian's villa 
— the most picturesque and imposing of any in Italy. They sur> 
pass those of the Palace of the Caesars. This villa was over- 
thrown during the siege of Tibur by Totila. I will not describe 
to you the old Greek Theatre with its ruined Procenium ; nor the 
beautiful Nymphaeum; nor the Pecile, 600 feet long, with its 
double row of columns still standing, nor the imperial Palace, nor 
the old barracks of the Pretorian guards — nor the grand Serapeon 
of Canopus, nor the beautiful Vale of Tempe — nor the prome- 
nades of the poets and philosophers who used to loiter in their 



156 LETTERS FROM ITALY 

green shades. I will leave you in ignorance of them all. You 
cannot appreciate them unless you wander in "propria persona" 
amid their haunted shades, with the dark cypress waving above 
you and the spirit of the Past whispering in your ear. 

Amid these ruins were found all the Egyptian antiquities in the 
Roman Capitol — the beautiful Mosaic of Pliny's Doves ; and the 
Venus di Medici. The road from hence up to Tivoli (the ancient 
Tibur) is through the most venerable olive grove I have ever 
seen. Between its dark foliage you get a glimpse now and then 
of the Roman Campagna, stretching on toward the sea — toward 
the eternal city — and the Sabine Hills. I should like to run on 
awhile about this ancient Tibur throned on its beautiful hill. 
Horace was accustomed to spend much of his time here, and 
wrote enthusiastically of its beauty. Not the broad Laceedsemon, 
said he, nor the rich fields of Larissee strike me so much 

" Quam domus AlbuneaB resonantis, 
Et preceps Auio ; et Tibumi lucus et uda 
Mobiiibus pomaria rivis." 

Here he would sit and compose his verses, and prayed that it 
might be the retreat of his old age. But a truce to Horace. I 
like him not and never did. His heartless lines ran in my head 
all the while I was on the track of his journey to Brundusium, on 
which the lazy, voluptuous sneerer lingered. He always ap- 
pears to my imagination like a little, thin, weasle-faced man, strut- 
ting slip-shod along, turning up his nose to mankind, and loving 
wine and women as much as the latter feared him. 

As I ascended the long hill toward the town, I thought more of 
the royal Zenobia than of all the emperors and poets that ever 
lived here. As she stood and looked off on the same valley 
on which I was gazing — now so desolate — then so magnificent 
with temples and palaces, how often she sighed for her queenly 
Palmyra — the beauty of the desert. Her realm exchanged for 
the Tiburtine hill, and a throne for the irksome kindness of a 
haughty captor, was enough to break her queenly heart. But 
let us enter Tivoli, once the head-quarters of the Ghibelline chiefs, 
and afterward of Rienzi, in his expedition against Palestrina. It 
is a dirty, contemptible little city of 17,000 inhabitants, [ts situ. 



TIVOLI. 157 

aiion is highly picturesque, but i ts climate so unhealthy that the 
popular distich runs, 

" Tivoli di mal coiiforto 

O, Piove, o lira vento, o suona a raorto," 

whicli perhaps might be rendered thus : 

" Oh Tivoli ! small comforts in thy climate dwell, * 

Where blows the wind, or rains, or tolls the funeral knell." 

The morals of the inhabitants may be gathered from the fact 
that in the year 1838, out of a population of 17,000 there were 
brought before the magistrate of the district 1,500 cases of fights, 
in which 180 persons were dangerously wounded, and 22 killed. 

The same ratio of crime in New- York, putting the population 
at half a million, would give 45,000 fights during the year, 5,400 
persons dangerously wounded, and 660 murders. At home this 
would be headed " Horrible state of public morals." 

But I beg pardon : I came here to see its water-falls, the most 
beautiful with the exception of Terni in the south of Europe. 
However, the Tivolians deserve this exposure for the villanous 
dinner they gave me. I will not bore you with the description 
of the ruined villas and temples that attract the traveller to Tivoli. 
I will mention but one — the Temple of the Tihurtme Syhil, perched 
on a cliff overhanging the valley of the cascades. It is a circular 
temple surrounded with an open portico of 18 columns, ten of 
which remain. Standing on that eminence, with its fine propor- 
tions and ancient classical look, it forms one of the most beautiful 
images I ever contemplated. As we emerged from the narrow 
path on to the platform of rock, which forms its base, we saw a 
table spread and an English company sitting around it, who had 
ordered their dinner to be brought to this picturesque spot. — There 
they sat eating under the shadow of the Temple of the Tilmrtine 
Syhil, with the gulf beneath them, and the roar of the water- falls 
in their ears. English like : — ^they can eat any where. Stand- 
ing on the edge of this cliff, the chief waterfall of the Anio is full 
in view a little to the left, on the other side of the gulf. Right 
out from the green hills it leaps, 100 feet into the mass of ver- 
dure below. From the moment it starts it shows a belt of foam, 
and from the disordered rocks where it strikes, springs a rainbow. 



153 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

ike a being of light, starting for the skies. The form of the hills 
— the deep verdure contrasting with the ruins around- — ^the clas- 
sic air hovering over all — combine to render it a spot of singular 
wildness and beauty. 

From this Sybilline Temple, a winding narrow path descends 
into the gulf and mounts the other side to the top of the water- 
fall. Adown this we descended, stopping at intervals to catch a 
glimpse of the foaming track of the " Cascatella," and hear the 
roar of its vexed waters. At length we reached the grotto of 
Neptune, a black cavern into which the cataract formerly emp- 
lied itself from the high wall of rock above it. The inundation 
of 1826 changed the course of the river and now a dark wild 
stream alone hurries through it. From this deep gulf the viev/ 
of the Sybilline Temple standing in its beautiful proportions high 
above — in the portico of which, looking do'WTi on us, were gath- 
ered a group of English ladies, twirling their bonnets in their 
hands, and looking as if they might be the ancient Sybils returned 
to their homes — the massive rocks around, and the singing of the 
water- falls in our ears, with the wizard-like names of the Syren's 
and Neptune's grotto, attached to the caverns over which we were 
leaning — combhied to render it for the moment a scene of en- 
chantment. 

The water, before it takes its leap, passes through two artiii- 
cial tunnels, cut side by side, through the solid rock, in which 
the English lady and myself awoke the echoes with our mirth. 
I do not know why it is, but I never get into a cavern or dark 
hideous hole without an irresistible impulse to halloo till all rings 
a^ain. From this point we took donkeys and rode around the 
semicircular hill to get a view of the series of cascades unseen 
before ; that come springing one after another into sunlight right 
out from the bosom of the green foliage. As we passed along, 
first spray, like mist boiling up from the earth, would appear, hov- 
ering in the air — and then the laughing Iris bovring to the green 
banks beyond, and then the rapid shoot of the stream. It was a 
succession of surprises. 

Returning we fell in with the suite of a Venetian Prince that 
had haunted us ever shace we left Naples — dining where we 



DONKEY RIDING. 159 



dined — sleeping where we slept, and by some strange fatality 
visiting galleries and ruins the same day we visited them. 

Speaking of the donkey ride reminds me that I have omitted 
a curious specimen of this mode of travelling which I witnessed 
this morning near the famous Plautian Tomb. On a little mouse- 
^.olored donkey, a trifle larger than a Newfoundland dog, shaggy 
,nd meek, were mounted a burly man and his wife, both astraddle, 
with the woman lefore and the man behind. The docile little fel- 
low went ambling along, picking up carefully his slender feet, and 
with his long ears flapping over his face looking as unconscious 
and innocent as a iamb. 

Truly yours. 



160 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXXIII. 

An Improvisatrice — Ascent of St. Peter's. 

Rome, April. 
Dear E. — I have just returned from hearing an Improvisa- 
trice. Bah ! — what a world of disappointment. I had read Co- 
rinna till I expected to behold in an Italian Improvisatrice an em- 
bodied inspiration. She sung to a small audience in one of the 
rooms of the Theatre Argentina. An Urn was left at the door, 
in which every one, who wished, dropped on a bit of paper 
the subject he wished her to improvise. This Urn was to be 
handed to the Improvisatrice, from which she must draw, by 
chance, the number of topics she was to render into verse during 
the evemng. I sat all on the " qui vive,'' waiting ner appear- 
ance, expecting to see enter a tall, queenly beauty, with the speak- 
ing lip and flashing eye uttering poetry even in their repose. I 
expected more, from the fact that these inspired birds are getting 
rare even in Italy, and this was the second opportunity there had 
been of hearing one during the entire year. Well, at last she 
came, a large, gross-looking woman, somewhere between thirty- 
five and fifty years of age, and as plain as a pikestaff. She as- 
cended the platform, somewhat embarrassed, and sat down : the 
Urn was handed her, from which she drew seven or eight papers, 
and read the subjects written upon them. They were a motley 
mess enough to turn into poetry in the full tide of song. I looked 
at her somewhat staggered, and wished very much to ask her, 
if, (as we say at home) she did not want to back out of the under 
taking. However, she started off boldly and threw off verse after 
verse with astonishing rapidity. After she had finished she sa. 
down, wip'd the perspiration from her forehead, while a man, 
looldng more like Bacchus than Cupid, brought her a cup of nee- 
^ar in the shape of Coffee, which she coolly sipped before the 



AN IMPROVISATRICE. 161 

audience, and then read the next topic and commenced again. 
Between each effort came the Coffee. Some of the subjects were 
unpoetical enough, and staggered her prodigiously. The " spav- 
ined dactyls" would not budge an inch, and she would stop — 
smite her forehead — go back — take a new start, and try to spur 
over the chasm with a boldness that half redeemed her failures ; 
sometimes it required three or four distinct efforts before she could 
clear it. The large drops of moisture that oozed from her fore- 
head, in the excitement, formed miniature rivulets down her 
cheeks, till I exclaimed to myself, well there is _perspiration there, 
whether there be aspiration or not ; and, after all, who can tell 
the difference. 

I will do her the justice, however, to say that her powers of 
versification, in some instances, were almost miraculous. She 
would glide on without a pause, minding the difficulties of rhythm, 
rhyme and figures, no more than Apollo himself. Columbus was 
one of her subjects, and she burst forth, (I give the sentiment 
only,) " Who is he, that, with pallid countenance and neglected 
beard, enters, sad and thoughtful, through the City's gates. The 
crowd gaze on him as, travel-worn, he walks along, and ask, 
'■ Who is he V — Christopher Colombo, is the answer. They turn 
away, for 'tis an unknown name." Then, with a sudden fling, 
she changed the measure, and standing on the bow of his boat, 
Hag in hand, the bold adventurer strikes the beach of a New 
World. The change from the slow, mournful strain she first 
pursued, to the triumphant bounding measure on v/hich the boat 
of the bold Italian met the shore, was like an electric shock, and 
the house rung with " brava, brava." But, alas ! there was no 
Corinna there ; I had rather heard the fair, proud-looking pianist 
that accompanied her. 

In the afternoon I drove with some friends to St. Peter's for the 
purpose of mounting to the top. No one can ascend it without an 
order from the office of the Cardinal Secretary of State. This 
order is obtained by a paper from somebody else, I forget whom. 
This paper my friend had sent me, with the request to send and 
get the order. I put it in my pocket with the full determination 
.0 do as he requested. But just as our carriage was driving up 
to the magnificen. steps of St. Peter's he asked if I had the order 



162 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

I slowly pulled forth \he paper from the spot where it had lain 
snugly for two or three days, and shook my head. " Then we 
are done for it," said he. I had no apology to make — ^there sat 
his lady, who had taken all this trouble for nothing. " Never 
mind," said he, " let us try what we can do without an order." 

We went to the Sacristan who kept the door, and told him our 
case, and plead to have the regulation dispensed with, but he war 
inexorable. I asked him if he could bear to have us return U 
our own country, after having come so far, without ascending St. 
Peter's. " Mi fa niente ma non posso permitterlo." " It is noth 
ing to me, but I cannot allow it." I then appealed to his gal- 
lantry, and made up a long story about the lady on my arm. 
" Mi rincresce moltissimo, signore, ma non e possibile," " I am very 
sorry, sir, but I can't help it," was all I could get out of him. 
I then undertook to bribe him, but it was of no use. He was the 
first Italian door-keeper I had seen, money would not buy. " Never 
mind," said Mr. , " I understand that some of these Sacris- 
tans keep permissions to sell." Off he started, and in a few min- 
utes returned with one tl:iat cost just 4 pauls — a half a dollar. I 
handed it to the Sacristan, and said, " There, will that do ?" — 
Oh, you would have shouted at the look of blank astonishment 
with which he regarded me. It was all right, signed and sealed 
as his Holiness directs, but said he, " Did you not write it your- 
self?" "What!" said I, "forge that seal?" pointing to the 
Cardinal's signet. He shook his head — " but where did you get 
it ?" " St. Peter gave it to me," I replied. (He opened his eyes 
still wqder) — " He did not wish me to leave his church without 
seeing its wonders." " II Santo Pietro e piu generoso di le." 
"Pass on," said the old man, with an ominous shake of the head, 
and we began to mount. The ascent to the top of the roof is so 
gradual that horses pass up and down with loads. On the roof 
the houses of the workmen scattered around look like a little vil- 
lage. 



ASCENT OF ST. PETER'S lb3 

incense throws a haze like a summer atmosphere over the wealth 
of marble beneath. The concave of the Dome is wrought in Mosaic, 
representing virgins and saints, &c. From the pavement it seems 
to be the finest of work, while here the stones are large as the end 
of your thumb. The sentence in Mosaic, " Tu es Petrus," dec, 
(Thou art Peter,) which is barely visible from below, is found to 
be composed of letters six feet long. An American Vandal had 
been here a few days before, and in order to carry away a me- 
mento of the Dome, had gouged out one of the eyes of a saint 
with his jack-knife. 

I will not attempt to describe the view from the top. The 
Mediterranean, blue and dim, in the distance on the one side, the 
Albano, the Sabine and Volscian hills on the other ; Rome, the 
Coliseum, Forum, the winding Tiber, palaces and temples, im- 
mortal each with its history, and all grand and mighty with the 
Past, were too much for one glance. The mind became perfectly 
stupified with the crowd of images and emotions that overwhelmed 
it. Glorious old Rome, that " coup d'oBil/' has become a part 
of my existence. It is daguerreotyped on my heart for ever. 

Now for a chapter of statistics. I hate them, but in no other 
way can you get an idea of the size of St. Peter's. I will not 
give you feet and inches, but say that if Trinity Church is fin- 
ished on the plan with which it was commenced you could pile 
about 12 of tliem into St. Peter's, and have considerable room left 
for walking about. — By taking off the steeples you could arrange 
two rows of them in the Church, three in a row, then clap on the 
steeples again under the Dome and they would reach a trifle 
more than half way to the top. You could put two churches 
like the Trinity under the Dome and have the entire nave of the 
Church, and both side aisles wholly unoccupied. Take three 
Astor Houses and place them lengthwise, and they would nearly 
extend the length of the inside of St. Peter's — make a double row 
of them and they would fill it up half way to the roof pretty snug. 
Thirty or forty common churches could be stowed away in it 
ndthout much trouble, and the four columns that support the 
Dome are each larger than an ordinary dwelling house. But 
this is nothing — the marble — the statuary — the costly tombs — -the 
architecture — the art are indescribable. Truly yours. 



1G4 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXXIV. 

Artists' Fete. 

Rome, April. 

Dear E. — To-day has been the great fete day of the Artisti- 
of Rome. I have endeavored in vain to discover the orisfin oi 
design of this oddest of all anniversaries in the imperial city. It 
is confined to no nation, but embraces the artists of every land 
who wish to partake of its festivities and fooleries. For several 
days previous, books are kept open at the Greek Cafe for those 
strangers who wish to enter their names as members on the occa- 
sion, and who receive in return a blue ribbon to wear as a badge 
during the festivities. The place of carousal is about ten miles 
from the city in the open Campagna. The location is as odd as 
the celebration that honors it. To be sheltered from the sun, if 
it be a bright Italian day, and to be protected from the wet, if it 
be a rainy one, they have selected the ancient Quarries of Rome 
for their festive hall. These Quarries are the interior of a slight 
eminence hollowed out into chambers and arches by the gradual 
excavations of former centuries. The dining-hall is an old forsa- 
ken ruin near by. At eight o'clock they meet from every part 
of the city in front of St. Maria Maggiore, to form their proces- 
sion. First comes a cart and oxen, garlanded for the occasion, 
on which is throned the President, dressed like nothing you ever 
beheld, and after him the motley group of artists and their friends, 
to the amount of several hundred. Each has his costume, and 
one would think they had not studied the old paintings in vain. 
Such out of the way and yet often picturesque garbs could be 
found in no country except Italy — and then the animals they ride, 
some are horses, some mules, and some the smallest, most villain- 
ous looking donkeys Rome can furnish. 

My friend and myself did not accompany the procession ou^ 



ARTISTS- FETE. 16o 



but walked up to view the baths of Dioclesian, and from them to 
the San Lorenzo gate, expecting to catch a return hack. Soon 
one came up, and I hailed the driver, asking him what he would 
demand to take us out to the fete. Just then it began to sprinkle 
—the first few drops of a heavy shower. The fellow looked as 
if he thought he had caught us, and his management you may 
take as a perfect illustration of an Italian's mode of making a 
bargain — with foreigners. He demanded just double of an ex- 
traordinary price, so I offered him half. No — he wouldn't lis- 
ten to it — and after some altercation I told him to drive on, I 
could do without him. He then fell a third, but I persisted in 
my first offer, and bade him go on. He drew up his reins and 
started off. But just before he turned an angle in the road which 
concealed him from view, he pulled up and hallooed to know if I 
would go for so much, naming a trifle less. I shook my head, 
and he vanished from sight. " There," said my friend, " we are 
now in a pretty fix — raining like a storm, and no way of getting 
to the fete or to the city." But I knew my man, and replied, 
" Do you suppose he has really gone ? In three minutes he will 
be back," and true enough the next moment a pair of black 
horses trotted into view, and our friend pulled up where we stood 
to drive another bargain. He fell still more from his original 
price, and began to praise his vehicle and show us all its comforts, 
especially in a rain storm. 

I was vexed at the fellow's impudence, and coolly asked, 
" Why have you returned ? I am not anxious at all to have your 
carriage ; you had better drive back to the city, or you will lose 
the opportunity of taking some one else." He drew up his reins 
with all the hauteur of an old Roman, and cracking his whip drove 
away with an air that said, as plainly as actions could say it, 
*' Good day, sir — this is the last you will see of me." After he 
had disappeared, my friend again began, " There, now, you have 
done it. He has gone sure enough, and we may get out of the 
scrape as we can." " Not a bit of it," said I. " The difference 
in the price he offers to take and I offer to give is trifling, but 
don't you see the rascal thinks to take advantage of our circum- 
stances ? I will stand here under this old colonnade till night 
before I will give him one baiocca more than I have ofTered him. 



JG6 LETTERS FROM ITALY 



— Besides, he will be back in a minute. It is true that last take 
off was very well done, but these fellows are used to acting. Such 
an offer as I made him he has not had to-day, and he is the last 
man to lose it. The next time "he will return and tell us to get 
in." I was right. In a few minutes the black team was in 
sight. The hauteur of the Roman had vanished, and with a 
touch of the hat and a smile that would have made the fortune of 
an English valet, he bade our " Excellencies" mount, hoping we 
would remember and give him a " huonomano.'^ " Not a bit of 
it," said I, though I afterward did, of my own free will. But I 
would not have it in the contract. 

Such is universally an Italian's mode of making a bargain. 
After driving five or six miles, we turned into the fields, through 
which, far before us, were slowly winding along trains of car- 
riages, filled with the fun-loving Italians. At length we came in 
sight of the spot consecrated by art — and such a sight. Did you 
ever see a "general iraining'' in the country 1 Then you have 
the first view of the " artists' fete." Scattered over the green 
field, were carriages filled with fair spectators, patches of stroll- 
ing peddlars, carts with the team detached and " wine and cake 
to sell," and all the strange and motley grouping of a Yankee 
''training ground." All these were on the summit of the emi- 
nence, underneath which were the quarries and the artists. As 
I approached, suddenly from out the bowels of the earth came a 
hurrah as wild and jolly as ever Bacchus, in the height of glory 
and greatness, made to ring through the home of the gods. The 
next moment I heard an earnest voice hurriedly inquire, " Gany- 
mede, Ganymede ! where is Jupiter ?" and then the Bacchana- 
lian song, " lo Bacche !" Really I began to think there might be, 
after all, a batch of the old gods below, holding a sort of anni- 
versary revel there, on the borders of their old dominions. I 
hastened down, and oh, such a spectacle ! It is impossible to de- 
scribe it. At one end of the caverns sat the presiding god. 
Around him were flags of every description and ornaments of no 
description. He had on a necklace made, I should suppose, of a 
huge Bologna sausage, with pieces a foot and a half long, putting 
out at intervals all round it, at the end of each of which stood 
an imp striving with all his might to fill it with wind. At his side 



ARTISTS' FETE. 167 



stood a drummer, that looked more like a grifRn than a man, 
beating rapid and hurried beats upon his drum, while at every 
pause arose the chorus of some wild German song. Before him, 
in the dirt, were all sorts of divinities waltzing — ^two-thirds drunk. 
Round and round they would spin, ankle deep, in the powdered 
clay, until they came on the broken rocks with a jar that made 
my bones ache even to see. Poor fellows, thought I to myself 
you will have enough to do to-morrow to count your bruises. 

This is only a specimen of what was passing. There wer» 
other groups in various parts of the quarries, each with its pecu 
liar scene. At length a company of Germans determined to have 
a ghost scene, and German like, they went through all the cere- 
monies of raising a spirit. In one of the darkest parts of the 
quarries was deposited a body wrapped in a sheet. At the en- 
trance stood a company of Germans and began one of their ghostly 
incantations. It was enough to chill one's blood. Slowly and 
solemnly the incantation rose and echoed through the cavern un- 
til the ghost was actually raised. There were many excellent 
singers among the German artists, and some of the chorusses 
were admirable. I never beheld a revel to which there was no 
limit, and no law in which there was such perfect abandon* 
ment as this. It seemed impossible that the human heart could 
so utterly throw off all restraint. Indeed it could hardly be called 
a revel — it was a frolic, a wild and lawless frolic. The animal 
spirits of each seemed at the evaporating point. 

In such reckless mirth, amid flowing wine and song and dance, 
the hours wore on, till the signal was given for the closing up 
scene, which w^as a general horse, donkey and mule race out 
upon the green sward. It was here that the figures and costumes 
showed to advantage. Thousands of people, some in carriages, 
some on foot, were scattered over the field. For a back ground 
a black rain cloud lay along the horizon. The sunlight from the 
clear West falling brightly over the grassy plain, threw the 
figures on it in strong relief against 'that dark cloud in the dis- 
tance, till every color, ribbon and plume, was distinctly revealed. 
As the crowd gave way, and horseman after horseman galloped 
into view, it seemed more like a description I had read in some" 
oriental tale, than an actual passing scene. Now ten or fifteen 



168 LETTERS PROM ITALY. 

in a company, mounted without a saddle, would gallop like the 
wind over the plain, their velvet mantles and plumes streaming 
in the wind, and the spangles in their vests and bonnets flashing 
like diamonds in the sunlight. And half of them were such 
wild spiritual looking beings. They were none of your hearty 
revellers, but had come out this once from the studio with all 
the marks of severe study and privation upon them, to be young 
and thoughtless for one day. Some of them were remarkably 
handsome fellows, and with their long black hair and blacker 
eyes and thin pale faces and singular costumes, shot past you like 
beings of another planet. There were Americans among the 
rest, and I am sure if they could have dropped into their native 
towns at home just as they were mounted and dressed to-day, 
their friends would have clapped them in a lunatic asylum " sans 
ceremonie.^^ The racing was a mere general scamper. One 
bold rider on a powerful black steed, galloped round and round 
without end or aim, while in another direction three artists were 
mounted on one little donkey, not much larger than a Newfound- 
land dog, which they were trying to beat into a gallop. But the 
poor little fellow could hardly waddle under his enormous load, 
and seemed perfectly stupificd at the sights and sounds around 
him. But the blows which fell thick and fast, were more natu- 
ral and home-like, and seemed to restore his self-confidence; for 
the next moment he laid back his long cars, and with that villain- 
ous look a donkey alone can give, let fly his heels into the air, 
and over tumbled one of the sons of the divine art. 

While I was laughing at this ludicrous scene, a beggar girl 
that had often molested me in Rome, came up and began her im- 
portunities again. She was the most impudent creature I ever 
met, and I could not shake her off, when a man dressed like a 
king, rode slowly up on his donkey, and addressing the girl in the 
most grave, deliberate, and solemn tone, said, " Andate via siete 
troppo importunente." " Go away, you are too importunate." The 
girl looked at him a moment, and walked away without saying 
a word. I could hardly thank him for laughter, but he never 
smiled, and wheeled his donkey away with the gravity of a phi- 
losopher. But it is impossible to describe the different groups in 
this strangest of all f«tes. An English lady whom I had often 



ARTISTS' FETE. 169 



met in different parts of Italy, stood and looked on in perfect de- 
light. She said she could not shake off the belief that she was 
in the midst of some Eastern romance. She was a beautiful 
sketcher, and in a few minutes the field and its grotesque groups 
were her own. How I envied her her possessions ! At length 
the crowd, as all crowds must, broke up. But a small party gal- 
loped on before, and ascending a green mound on which stood 
an old ruin, wheeled and awaited the procession. In their pic- 
turesque garbs, beside that ancient ruin, and both revealed in the 
soft light of the setting sun, they formed a strange and beautiful 
group. 

But soon the towers and obelisks of old Rome rose on the vie\r, 
and I seemed to stand rebuked in their presence. I thought how 
these orgies had been celebrated over the grave of a fallen em- 
pire. I was told that Thorswalien a few years ago joined with 
them, and shook his gray locks with the merriest. 

Truly yours. 



17n LETTERS FROM ITALY 



LETTER XXXY. 

Sirocco-— IMosaic Centre-Table — Borghesian Villa — Tasso's Oak — Farewell 
to St. Peter's, &c. 

May, 1843. 

Dear E. — I fear you are becoming tired of Rome, though one 
never wearies of writing about it. Each hour here would make 
a letter; but not to task your patience farther, I will give you a 
single chapter out of my diary, and then we will av/ay for Flor- 
ence and the green, free, open country. 

Saturday, 10th. — Just returned from Villa Pamfili, revived 
and almost cheerful. For three days a terrible sirocco has been 
blowing that has taken the very life out of me. The first day I 
grew weak ; the second, hot and feverish, and took to my bed, 
and concluded a E^oman fever was my destiny. But this morning 
the wind changed to the north, and the dirty sky looked clear 
ao-ain. A little revived, I called a carriao-e, and drove out to 
the Villa Pamfili. Leaving the diiver and his horses under the 
shadow of a clump of trees, I strolled away from the magnifi- 
cent gardens into the open field, and lying down under a lofty 
fir-tree, and looking off towards the mouth of the Tiber and dis- 
tant Ostia, drank in the fresh air till my blood grew cool agaLn. 
Those grounds, how extensive and beautiful they are, with their 
promenades, and canals, and waterfalls, and fountains, and flow- 
ers, and statues ! 

Sunday, 11th. — ^Just returned from Vespers in St. Peter's. How 
I love to linger under those great arches, while the shades of 
tv/ilight deepen on the statues and figures around ; and hear the 
Vesper hymn steal out of the distant chapel, and float over this 
wond rous tempi e . 

And that strange Pilgrim — how he arrested my attention. 
From the far oITiiills he had wandered there for once in his life, 
to worship. Amazed at the magnificence around him. he forgot 



MOSAIC CENTRE-TABLE. 171 

his rags, that contrasted so strikingl}^ with those costly ornaments, 
and leaned on his pilgrim staff-— the blanket on which he had slept 
in his pilgrimage, beneath his arm— and gazed like one in a 
trance, around him. The lofty nave — -the images of P.rophets 
and Apostles, that leaned over him — the dim religious light ; and 
that now dying, now triumphant music, was too much for him, 
and he bowed his head and wept. Drop after drop, the big tears 
fell on the tesselated pavement, and his swelling heart seemed 
ready to burst under the tide of emotions that pressed on it. Fare- 
well, Pilgrim— we shall never meet again. 

Monday night, 12th. — I have just returned from a social party 
at the house of an English officer — -La Strada delle tre Fontane, 
(the street of the three fountains). I met there an Italian noble I 
had often seen in the north of Italy. He was an officer in the 
army of his Sardinian Majesty. Poor fellow ! he had fallen in 
love with an English lady in Genoa, and had come down to get 
a dispensation from the Pope that he might marry her. It was 
slow work, but he thought he should succeed. 

Tuesday, 12th. — Accompanied Mrs. to see the top of a 

Mosaic centre-table. What a transcendently beautiful thing ! 
It was finer work than I ever saw in a breastpin at home. It 
needed the closest inspection to detect it was not a painting. The 
man had been four years in finishing it, and had just received an 
order for it from a Russian Princess, v/ho was to give him $4,000. 
It represented Rome in four different aspects, the scenes going 
round the outer edge of the table. First, the ' Piazza del Popolo,' 
by sunrise, with its gate and obelisk ; second, St. Peter's, with its 
glorious colonnade, obelisk and fountains, under the blaze of a 
bright noon -day ; next came the Forum, the Capitol, the ruined 
Palace of the Csesars, and the lonely columns standing around 
Ibis focus of old Roman glory, bathed in the soft light of the 
setting sun ; last of all the Coliseum by moonlight, and a more 
perfect moon I never saw painted. It had beside an elaborately 
wrought centre piece. I never broke the commandment " Thou 
shalt not covet" so much in a half an hour in my life as during 
the time I was inspecting this table. The artist was an intelli- 
gent and pleasant man, and gave me some of the composition 
by which mosaic work is raado, and explained the whole process, 



172 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



but I have forgotten it already. At sunset I strolled around the 
Pincian Hill, that overlooks Rome and the Tiber. It is a aeau- 
tiful promenade, filled with trees, statues, &c. ; but, alas ! as I 
was passing near where some repairs were making, I saw thirty 
prisoners chained two and two, guarded by soldiery, and sullenly 
performing their allotted toil. 

In the evening, after tea, our good professor, who never fails in 
his daily lessons, started up and said, " This is the night of the 
Feast of the Sepulchres, would you like to see the ceremony V 
In a moment we were off. We entered church after church, in 
each of which the ceremony- was different, but each representing 
Christ in the Sepulchre. The churches were dark with the ex- 
ception of a few lights around the place of supposed burial. At 
length we entered one in a side chapel of which lay a wax figure, 
large as life, representing our Savior in the rigidness of death. 
The hair lay matted on his forehead — the blood was flowing over 
his agony- wrung brow, and his limbs composed in the decency of 
death. Close by the figure, kneeled two monks— their faces 
buried in their hands, and uttering not a sound. Away from the 
recess back in the darkness, were the silent figures of men and 
women kneeling amid the marble columns of the church ; that 
grew dimmer and dimmer as they retired, till lost in the gloom. 
That bloody, murdered form — those cowled and silent monks 
kneeling over it — the deep hush and darkness amid so many 
forms, was too much for my nerves. I pushed open the door and 
rushed into the open air, drew a long breath while a fearful pres- 
sure seemed to lift from my heart. Well, 'tis a strange world, 
and the " lights and shadows of a human soul," who can write ! 

Wednesday/, ISth. — Rode all over the grounds of the Borghe- 
sian villa. This is to Rome what Hyde Park is to London, and 
towards evening there is an incessant whirl of carriages around its 
groves of ilex and laurel, and through its lo ig avenues of cypresses, 
and past its flashing fountains and delicute temples, and rows of 
statuary. These grounds are tnree miles round, threaded in every 
possible direction with roads. At the farther side is the palace 
filled with beautiful statuary. In one room is Canova's famous 
reclining Venus, for which Pauline, the beautiful sister of Bona- 
parte, sat. There is a story in Rome that a lady once asked 



AN IRISH GARDENER. 173 

Pauline if she did not feel a little uncomfortable in sitting before 
Canova for her statue (alluding to the indelicacy of being dis- 
robed before the artist), and she pretending to understand her 
as referring to her feeling somewhat cold in such a predicament, 
answered, " Oh no, the room was very warm.^^ (This Borghese 
married one of the daughters of the famous English Catholic Earl 
of Shrewsbury.) The statue is beautiful — so was Pauline, who 
is said to have had but one defective feature, and that her ears. 
They were so small as to be almost a deformity. 

Saturday, 16th, — I skip over two days. This morning I re- 
ceived a note from an American gentleman inviting me to accom- 
pany him and his two sisters to the Pope's palace on the Quirinal. 
I was at the reading-room when they started, and as the carriage 
drove up, the wheels came somewhat near to a peppery, half- 
crazy English cavalry officer. He began to swear and curse the 
driver, when I, somewhat piqued at his impudence in the pres- 
ence of the ladies, stept in and told the driver to move on. The 
officer immediately tipped his hat to me and apologised, and said 
in the blandest manner, " Mr. H. (calling me by name,) I believe 
your book is not in this library," (referring to the one attached to 
the reading-room). How the fellow knew my name puzzled me, 
and the question and all taking me quite aback, I replied. What 
did you say, sir ? " Are you not from New Orleans, and have you 
not written a work ?" I have not the pleasure of hailing from 
New Orleans, I replied, nor have I been guilty of writing a book. 

We strolled all over the great palace — into the very sanctum 
sanctorum of his Holiness. * * 

The garden is a mile in circumference, and filled with flowers, 
and birds, and plants of every description. There is one fountain 
that plays an organ, (when it plays at all), and little statues 
standing in niches around the grotto in which the organ is placed 
lift, at the same time, instruments to their lips, and chant an ac- 
companiment. The chief gardener is an Irishman, and Pat is 
the same practical joker, wherever you find him. Even living 
in the shadow of the palace of his Holiness, cannot knock the fun 
out of him : and there was so much of the ' lurking devil ' in this 
fellow's eye, that I watched every movement, lest he should play 
u& a trick — for every now and then, he would disappear in the 



1T4 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

thick foilage. and the next moment from some unexpected quarter 
v.-ould issue jets of water, crossing each other in all directions, 
and making an arch over our heads as we passed. There was a 
group of some half-dozen Priests, just before us, who had come 
from the country to attend the ceremonies of Holy Week in 
Rome. They were visiting the garden of their Spiritual Head, 
and stared about them in undisguised astonishment. x\t length 
they got tangled in with our party, and, as we were passing up a 
walk hedged closely in, I saw Pat slip slyly away amid the fo- 
liage. Expecting some mischief on hand, I halted and fell a little 
back, bidding my friends do the same. In a moment the walk 
spread out into a circular form, and the long black-robed Priests 
scattered themselves over it ; when suddenly, right out of the 
gravelled path, sprang a group of jets, perfectly deluging them 
with water. They suddenly stopped like chickens when the 
shadow of a hawk darkens over them, and then scampered oflF, as 
Pac said, " as if the Divil was after them." Dripping with water, 
and shaking their broad-brimmed beavers, they presented a most 
sorry spectacle. * * 

Tuesday, 2Atli. — Walked all over the ruins in the region of 
the Forum and Caracalla's Baths. This is the only way to see 
and feel them. I never would ride again here. Oh! how sad 
to muse amid these fragments of a shivered world, with nought 
to disturb you but the chirp of the cricket, or the sigh of the pass- 
ing wind as it stirs the ivy that dangles from some mouldering 
wall. There they are in the bright sunshine, men spinning ropes in 
the old Roman Forum, or singing with Italian carelessness under 
the shadow of that lofty, solitary column, that stands like a tomb- 
stone over the grave of an empire. How those peasantry stared 
at me as I stood, like one bewildered, under the great arches that 
supported the Palace of the Csesars, gazing on the cattle stabled 
there, and on the thoughtless owners pitching hay into apartments 
right under the very throne of Rome. The sentence of Gibbon 
came like a mournful echo to me — '•' and the barbarian has long 
since stabled his steed in the Palace of the C^sars." — I strolled 
on to the old Circus Maximus, where the rape of the Sabines was 
committed. It is a garden, and an old man was carting ma- 
nure into it. I thought I would see how much he would know f 



TASSO'S OAK 175 



that field of fame, so I inquired if that was the Circus Maximus. 
He looked at me as if he thought I was an ignoramus, and replied, 
**No, signore, it. is a garden J^ And this is glory ! * * . 

At evening we drove to the convent San Onifrio, or rather to the 
foot of the hill on v/hich it stands. After knocking for nearly a 
quarter of an hour at the gate we gained admittance. Here Tasso 
died. An oak stands near, called Tasso's oak.- He came to Rome 
to be crowned, and was taken sick. He retired to this convent, 
which overlooks entire Rome, and from its elevation has a pure air, 
to recover his health. Under this oak he used to sit and gaze down 
on the imperial city in its glory, which was weaving a crown — for 
his grave. The oak has been broken down by a storm, but the 
stump still remains. I plucked some of the splinters to bring away 
as a memorial. I was in the rooni where he died. A cast was 
taken of him after his death, which is preserved with great care • 
and near by in a glass case hangs tke last letter the poet ever wrote. 
While I am writing the daughter of the man who owns my rooms 
has answered the bell and wishes to know what I want. It is 
somewhat chilly and I request a little fire. In oixier to kindle it 
she picks up my splinters from Tasso's oak. I spoke out so 
sharply that she turned her large eyes on me in wonder. V/hy, 
said I, those are from Tasso's oak — I would not take 50 scudi for 
them — I am going to take them to America. She clapped her 
hands and laughed till all rung again. She took it for a good 
joke and proceeded to lay them on the fire. I remonstrated so 
earnestly that she felt I must be in earnest, and asked with the 
most perfect naivete, ' What, have you no such wood in America V 
Oh Tasso, such again is glory ! 

Saturday, 2Sth. — Saturday again. I have, these last few dayS; 
strolled over the city — made a few calls and wrote a few letters. 
I have seen Pompey's Statue, ' which all the while ran blood' 
when great Csesar fell at its base. I have wandered over the 
"Jews' Quarter," where the old clothes hang in masses alono- the 
streets. Every night at eight o'clock they are locked up in the 
two streets they occupy. Palaces, Studios, and Paintings have 
come in for their share. What a beautiful young Bacchus 
I saw in Thorswalden's Studio. The drunken God could be seen, 
in the baby sleeping amid the rich clusters of grapes. A note i« 



176 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

on my table from Dr. D y of New York. He knows not 

what pleasure his last conversation gave me. 

Sunday, 29th. — To-morrow, I expect to start for Florence, 
and have been this evening to bid St. Peter's good bye. It is 

strange how affection will grow on one, for a mere pile of stone 
and brick ; but I have really and forever fallen in love with this 
glorious old Temple. I did not feel sadder when the setting sun 
went down over the lessening shore of my father-land, than to- 
ni2:ht when I knew I must behold St. Peter's no more. I strolled 
around — now across the nave — now up and down the side aisles, 
and away into the transept, looking at nothing in particular, but 
lettmg the impression of the whole fall like a mighty shadow on 
my heart. The smoke of incense spread like a mist over the tes- 
selated pavement, and the pealing organ now swelled out through 
the amplitude in triumphant bursts of music, and now died away 
in mournful cadences through the dim arches, while the chant 
of priests arose and fell in strange echoes on the air. Fa'^, far 
away up through the heaven-seeking dome stole the rays of the set- 
ting sun, as if he wished his last look to be in this great Temple. 
One by one, the crowd departed, till I v>-as almost alone amid the 
forest of marble. Every statue became a spiritual being worship- 
ping silently there — every shadow the passing of the Invisible 
One. My heart beat' audibly in my bosom, and I could have 
knelt before the silent altar and wept. The spirit of the Eternal 
seemed to have breathed on his Temple. The silence and sol- 
itude at length became painful, and I turned towards the door. 
There I gave the last farewell look. The great columns stood 
dim and stately in the gathering gloom, while the lofty arches were 
lost in the darkness. Far away burned the feeble tapers before 
the high altar, while the shadow of a monk now and then gliding 
before them in his silent dut}^, added to the mystery of the scene. 
Farewell, great Temple ; thou hast taught my heart a lesson 
it will never forget, and as I dive into the living stream of men 
again, thy shadow shall ever be on the water. Thy heart-break- 
ing ]\Iiserere and thy sweet Vesper Hymns shall never lose their 
echo ; thy mighty dome and magnificent proportions, and thy per- 
feet form lighted by its thousands of torches standing like a fairy 
creation amid the deep night, I carr\" with me. Yours. &c- 



OUT OF ROME 177 



LETTER XXXVI. 

Out of Rome — An English Captain. 

Term, May, 1843. 

Dear E.— We are out of Rome, and I will not trouble you 
with our long quarrels with Vetturini before we got off. For 
several successive days, an English gentleman and myself went 
to the Post House to get a carriage and horses, to be posted on to 
Florence ; but Rome was emptying itself, and all had been en- 
gaged days beforehand. So we finally struck up a bargain with 
a Vetturino to carry us through with one team. 

We started with rather a bad omen. I was up before it was 
daylight, and stepping into a narrow street for the purpose of 
crossing to the lodgings of my English friend, encountered four 
men bearing, noiselessly and rapidly along, a corpse. 

But imagine us finally standing at the Piazza del Popolo, while 
the officers examine our passports to see if all is right. (By the 
way, how odd it is, that one must fortify himself with any quan- 
tity of signatures, and quarrel his way into a city, then encoun- 
ter the same trouble in getting out of it.) But, as I was about to 
say, picture to yourself a vehicle, built somewhat like a hack, 
except that it has a calash top over the driver's seat in addition to 
the main covering — painted pale green, with a gold-leaf grape- 
vine running around it for a border, and four fat lazy horses at- 
tached to it, and you have our " establishment." It was finely 
cushioned, however, and rode easier than any hack. 

As we trotted away from the walls of the eternal city, an in- 
describable sadness stole over me. It seemed like leaving the 
grave-yard of all that was great on earth. There the heart of 
the world once beat till the farthest extremities felt the mighty 
pulsations. The greatest and fiercest souls earth ever nurtured 
had stormed and died there. Therf man had wrought with high- 



178 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

est pride, and skill, and force ; and there now were only his 
greatest ruins. Oh what a bitter mockery that fallen empire, its 
broken thrones, and faded glories uttered on man and man's am- 
bition. And yet there was as much of pity as sarcasm in their 
silent language. Ambition with thy heated blood, and wild fever 
tossings, and cursed devastations, and bloated pride ; come look 
«n thy greatest, most perfect work ! 

As I was indulging in this train of bitter reflection, I looked 
up, and lo, there stood before me a small house perfectly buried in 
grape-vines, and hedges, and flowers ; and on it painted in large 
capitals, " Parva Domus Sed magna Quies." The singularity 
of the inscription, and the sweet little nest on which it was writ- 
ten, took me wholly by surprise, and captivated me at once. "A 
small house but great repose" — then thou art worth all Rome — 
aye, and the world to boot. " Magna Quies," I v/ished I had the 
house ! Rest — repose ! — Oh, that is heaven to the endless chase 
and disappointments of life! I looked again on the little para- 
dise. Bah! it was written there io make it rent well. Fleas and 
filth ! who ever found rest in an Italian house unless he had the 
hide of a shark ? 

Ascending a long hill, twelve or fourteen miles from Rome, I 
paused, and turning toward the city, now dim in the smoky dis- 
tance, bade it a long, last farewell. 

" There she stands, 
Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe, 
An empty urn within her withered hands 
Whose holy dust was scattered long ago." 

Stopping to breakfast, about 12 o'clock, at a small inn, I wan- 
dered off" in the fields. On returning, who should I encounter but 
my old peppery English officer, who once took me for an author 
and from New Orleans. He was foaming and sweanng away at 
his Vetturino. As soon as he saw me he poured forth a perfect 
volley of invectives against the Italians. His horses had broke 
down, beside having proved balky. He would not go another 
inch — he would return to Rome immediately — then crashed one 
of John Bull's sturdy oaths. I had cherished a little grudge 
against the sputtering old egotist, and I confess took a wicked 
pleasure in his trouble — nay, added to it. I told him the same 



AN ENGLISH CAPTAIN. 179 

carriage and horses had been offered to me but I durst not trust 
the concern, and added the owner proposed to take me for fifty 
scudi, but I would not have it on any terms. (This was literally 
true.) Fifty scudi ! exclaimed he ; I give eighty -five. Seeming 
to grow warm myself at the enormity of the deception, I replied, 
Eighty-five scudi ! Why, my dear sir; you are robbed — shame- 
fully robbed, and then if you should never get to Florence Vvitli 
that team. " I know it," said he, " I will go back to Rome im- 
mediately." But, I replied, there is one difficulty in the way : as 
you have made a bargain, the authorities v/ill doubtless compel 
you to fulfil it, especially as the fellow promises to take you ou 
without delay. I am sorry — but — really, my dear sir, I am 
afraid there is no help. The Captain now stood at boiling heat, 
and the poor Vetturino fairly shook with terror. " Come," said 
the Captain, " come tell my wife and daughter how they offered 
you this same ricketty concern, when they knew it v/ould break 
down. Come, come on," said he. I did not exactly like the 
prospect before me, but made the best of it and followed on 

Judge of my astonishment on entering the room to see a fair 
young sweet English face, that had often arrested my attention in 
the streets of Rome, the owner of which I never dreamed of being 
the daughter of my sputtering Captain. She was an authoress of 
some fame, and a novelist to boot. The first thought that struck 
me was — " how extremely odd, and what a misfortune if she 
should turn back. What a bit of sunlight she would be on the 
road during the six days' journey before us. To see her at the 
lonely hotels we shall stop at, and amid the glorious scenery we 
shall gaze on, would be no slight addition to the pleasure of the 
journey." The Captain immediately started off on his furious 
gallop, repeating what I had said before. At the first pause the 
little beauty remarked, " Yes, we must return I think as soon as 
we have breakfasted." This was tipping over my castle in the 
air in a moment, and how to counteract what I had told the Captain 
seemed not so plain. I could have bitten off xny tongue with vex- 
ation. However, I determined to put a- bold face on it, and re- 
plied, '• By no means ; I think you have a remarkably excellent 
carriage — it is light and easy, while ours is a huge lumbering af- 
fair." ^' Oh the carriage is well enough," said she, " but the 



180 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

horses are such dreadfully poor creatures, I am sure they will 
die before they get to Florence." " Not at all, not at all — I can 
assure you ; these lean Cassius looking horses are the best to get 
over the ground — ^your fat Italian animals are perfect oxen on the 
road • beside there is nothing better in Rome now — all are ' en 
route.' Moreover we will make the Vetturino change the horse that 
gave out, and continue to do so as often as one fails." The Captain 
seemed utterly unable to comprehend the sudden change in my 
views, and stood and stared at me in a perfect puzzle. He could 
not understand the difference between the prospect of having a 
Captain Brimstone for a companion on the way, and a young 
beautiful English woman. Just then a happy thought came to 
my aid. It occurred to me that the Captain had raved so on the 
way that the poor apologies for horses had been urged to their ut- 
most powers by the frightened Vetturino, and I inquired how long 
they had been in driving from Rome. It was as I supposed ; they 
had come like distraction. Why, said I, you have come it in an 
hour and a half less time than we. Why you will trot right 
away from us. This idea tickled the Captain amazingly ; he 
rubbed his hands, chuckled, and turning to his daughter said, 
*' Don't you see, my dear, we have beat them an hour and a 
half. I think we can venture to go on." We made the Vettu- 
rino change one of his horses and all was soon settled. 

You may smile at this episode, but it is one of those things that 
make up a traveller's existence, and interest him perhaps deeper 
than more important matters. The first night I had a quarrel with 
our Vetturino from principle. Paying for our lodgings himself, 
I knew that he, like all his fraternity, would cheat us if he could. 
A terrible fuss the first night, as if you expected vastly more 
than any body could give, and was one of the most querulous of 
the fretful species, is indispensable to secure decent treatm.ent on 
the way. I will not weary you with our slow desolate ride through 
Etruria. Take one hut as a specimen of many. It stood by the 
road-side, in the open ground that stretched away as far as the 
eye could reach, without enclosures, and without cultivation — 
built of a sort of weed that grows wild in that section, and which 
has the appearance of small brushwood. I entered it, and there 
•an the bare ground, sat a mother with several children. A pot 



BRIDGE OF AUGUSTUS. 181 

was boiling in the centre, with some vegetables in it. The fire 
frightened me in the midst of so much combustible matter. 1 
spoke to the mother, and inquired about her circumstances, and 
added, " Are you not afraid of that fire ? What would you do if 
this tinder-box here in which you live should catch fire V She 
clasped her hands, turned her black eyes toward heaven, and 
laughing outright, exclaimed, " God help us then." I do not be- 
lieve an Italian woman ever prayed without a laugh in one corner 
of her heart. 

I thought I would describe, but cannot, the approach to pictu- 
resque Civita Castellana — the wonderful ravine that passes it, 
with the huts of washer- women dwindled down to a point at the 
bottom — the beautiful valley of the Tiber which we dropped into 
beyond, where Macdonald, in the retreat of the French army 
from Italy, cut his way through the Neapolitan ranks, though 
they out-numbered him three to one — a valley then filled with 
the smoke of battle, but now the sweetest, loveliest spot, that ever 
smiled in the sunshine. Here the artists from Rome flock in the 
summer, and dream away its oppressive heat in this Elysian 
field. I wished also to take you along the vale of the Nar, with 
its milk-white flood, and hermitages perched on the rocks, like 
eagles' nests — and bid you listen to the chattering of one of the 
most ignorant monks I ever conversed with ; but I must hasten on. 

At Narni was a celebration in honor of St. John, and such a 
collection of queer costumes you never beheld. The streets were 
strewn with evergreens ; and processions were formed, headed 
with a wooden cross, some fifteen feet high, while in the Churches 
were drums, and trumpets, and armed men. But this, too, I must 
pass by, and a queer adventure that befel me here, and ask you 
only to accompany me while the carriage is left to meet us some 
three miles ahead, to the Gulf where stands the ruinous arches of 
the ' Bridge of Augustus.' This Bridge, built by the Emperor, con- 
nects two hills, and has three arches more than sixty feet high, built 
of blocks of marble, without cement or cramps of any description 
to fasten them. The middle arch is broken, and beneath it rusher? 
the torrent as it rushed when strode the Emperor of the world over. 
It is a noble ruin, and through the arch a distant hermitage among 
the rocks looked picturesque enough. Truly yours. 



182 LETTERS FRO:»I ITALY. 



LETTER XXXVII. 

Falls of Temi. 

Terni, May, 1643. 
Dear E. — We reached here about 3 o'clock this afternoon, 
nnd immediately hired another carriage and started for the 
" Falls'of Terni. ^^ You can visit them in two ways — by begin- 
ning at the bottom, and walking to the top, or riding up a moun- 
tain by a recently made road, a mile or two, and descending to 
the bottom. Our guide and driver thought of course it would be 
far better to begin at the bottom, for more than " eighteen rea- 
sons," but especially as it would save driving us some two or 
three milos up a steep, narrow, and winding way. But let me 
advise the traveller in the first place always to ride, to the top, and 
send his carriage back. In the second place, to fill his pocket 
with coppers, and as soon as he sees a beggar approach, or a man 
picking up stones out of the path, or even standing still, to hurl 
one at him. A dollar or two spent in this way is a clear gain, to 
one who wishes to enjoy the scenery ; otherwise he will have 
every fine emotion dissipated, and his very soul tormented into 
madness, by the incessant cry of " Signore, un baiocca — per 
carita — mi miserabile," et cetera. My small stock was soon ex- 
hausted, and the moment I stopped amid the roar of the cataract, 
to listen to its great anthem, or look on its torn waters, I v/as 
besieged by some half dozen ragamufhns, till I had no resource 
but run for it. They always take it for granted you lie when 
you tell them you have no more small change. I will not attempt 
to describe these Falls. I will say only that the upper Fall 
is about 50 feet high, tlie second between 600 and 700. and the 
long sheet of foam wh'.ch forms the third 270 feet, making in all 
about 1,000 feet — and then refer you to Byron's description, be- 
ginning— 



FALLS OF TERNL 183 



" The roar of waters ! — from the headlong height 
Velino cleaves the wave-worn precipice ; 
The fall of waters ! rapid as the light 

The flashing mass foams, shaking the abyss ; 
The hell of waters ! where they howl and liiis, 
And boil in endless torture ; wliile the sweat 
Of their great agony, wrung oat from this 
Then- Phlegethon, curls round the rocks of jet 
That gird the gulf around, in pitiless horror set." 

I will merely add by way of comment that this description is 
stretched a little. I will say, however, in justice to Byron, that I 
have ever found Childe Harold's descriptions faithful almost to the 
letter, except in this single instance, and here I excuse him on the 
ground that he had never seen any large cataracts, and hence was 
naturally impressed beyond measure with the sublimity of this 
really fine v.ater-fall. But the "infant sea" he speaks of I could 
throw my hat across, and '' the eternity" he thinks he sees " rush- 
ing on" is the smallest probably most men will ever experience. 

Yet the cataract is worth a visit. The rapid shoot of the 
waters at the summit — the long reckless leap of the torrent that 
is dashed into the minutest particles of foam at the bottom, which 
go rising up like smoke over the face of the rock — the dizzy 
height — the roar and the solitude, impress the mind with awe and 
wonder ; and then the hidden and mysterious paths that lead to 
the bottom — now burying you in the side of the hill, and now 
carrying you to the very brink of some precipice, whose forehead 
is bathed in the falling spray, keep you in a state of constant ex- 
citement. 

The finest view, however, is from a rock on the opposite moun- 
tain. From this point you look directly on the face of the cata- 
ract, and take in the whole at a glance. In gazing on this water- 
fall I v^^as struck with the power of a poetic imagination to im- 
personate every thing. Byron says, 

" While the sweat 
Of their great agony, wrung out from this 
Their Phlegethon, curls Found the rocks of jet," «Stc. 

And sure enough, there it is — the " sweat of their great agony." 
The spray, condensing on the black sides of the rocks, trickles 



184 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

down as if pressed out of them by their torment, under the eter- 
nal shock of the falling cataract upon them. As I stood gazing 
at this mad stream, breaking itself into a thousand fragments in 
its desperate leap, a thunder-cloud slowly threw fold after fold 
over the dwarf firs that fringed the top, till the heavy masses 
seemed fairly to press their dark bosom on the summit of the 
hill^while the roar of the blast, and the low growl of the distant 
thunder, mingling with the roar of the cataract, made it a scene 
of wild sublimity. I had missed the " Iris," but I was repaid by 
the storm. The day seemed changing into night, and I at length 
turned away to find some place of shelter before the cloud should 
burst over me. Descending, I met my peppery Captain and his 
sweet daughter. I had no particular solicitude about the Cap- 
tain's skin, but I was anxious to save the little beauty from the 
shower I knew would soon be upon us. I besought her to return, 
assuring her she would be drenched if she proceeded. " What," 
said she, in a voice like a bird, " is not that point of rock I just 
saw you sitting upon the best spot from which to view the cata- 
ract ?" Undoubtedly, madam ; but if you attempt to reach it you 
will certainly be overtaken by the storm. "But I must^see it," 
she replied. I urged her in vain to desist, and was on the 
point of offering my services, when wisely considering it would 
not improve my personal appearance to get a thorough drenching, 
nor make the rain any the less heavy on her, I concluded to let 
the wilful little creature take her soaking alone. 

I had scarcely reached our carriage before the rain came 
down in solid masses. I took shelter in a curious looking hole, 
tenanted by an old hag whose company was almost as bad as the 
thunder storm. I stood and looked out on the driving rain, and 
shrugged my shoulders as I thought of my English Hotspur and 
his wife and daughter. At length, tired of waiting the motion of 
the storm, I hired a half of an umbrella for two pauls, and start- 
ed off, and such a wild-cat ride I never took before. The driver 
whipped his horses into a dead run till the carriage spun like a top. 

After we had fairly got home and down to our tea the Cap- 
tain and his family arrived. He was cool as a cucumber, while 
the young authoress, drenched to the skin, crept demurely along, 
looking the very picture of desolation. In a few minutes, how- 



FALLS OF TERNI. 185 



ever, the Captain's blood was again up, and he came in sputtering 
away about fevers, and agues, et cetera, that he feared would fol- 
low this exposure. You must know an Italian is nervously afraid 
of getting wet, as in this climate it induces fever. 

So ends my trip to Terni, and the Cataract of Velino. It is 
singular that Terni and Tivoli, two of the finest waterfalls in Eu- 
rope, should both be artificial. The Romans made this cascade 
by turning the waters of the Velinus from their original course^ 
over this precipice. In this way they drained the rich plains of 
Rieti. It has been changed and modified much since, according 
as the inundations of the valley demanded it. 

Truly yours. 



186 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XXXVIIL 

Perugia — Ciituranus — Battle-Field of Thrasymene. 

Dear E. — I have been five days on the road from Rome to this 
place, and designed to give you a letter filled with the occurrences 
of each day ; but I will crowd the five into one letter, and by this 
process endeavor to give you the cream of the whole. Spoleto, 
with its ruined aqueducts and ancient gate, called the gate of 
Hannibal, I must pass over, and hurry away to Foligno, just bid- 
ding you stop a moment — and you must be very careful or you 
will pass it unnoticed — to see the tiny temple mentioned by Pliny, 
and dedicated in olden time to the river god, Clitumnus. Cliilde 
Harold is the best guide-book for this region, and Byron stopped 
here and sung — 

" But thou. Clitumnus ! in thy sweetest wave 
Of the most living crystal that was e'er 
The haunt of river nymph, to gaze and lave 
Her hmbs where nothing hid them," &c 

And again — 

*' And on thy happy shore a Temple still 
Of small and delicate proportions," &:c. 

But you can read it for yourself. At Foligno we staid all 
night, and a gloomy one it was. The rain had poured all day, 
and the streets were muddy and lonely, while on every gloomy 
church was painted a death's head and cross bones. "With the 
uprising sun we were oft, and the clear air of the open country 
quickly effaced the memory of the dirty town. 

Assisi sits on the slope of a hill, about a mile and a half from 
the road, one of the most picturesque towns in Italy. Its long 
rows of aqueducts, stretching from niountain to mountain — its 
lofty commanding citadel, and its old battlements and towers en- 
compassing it around combine to render it a striking object as it 



PERUGIA. 187 



iie« along the height. Dante gives a most beautiful description 
of it, beginning — 

" Intra Tupino e I'acqua, che discende 
Dal colle eletto dal beato Ubaldo," &c., &c. 

Perugia comes next in the catalogue, situated on the top of a 
hill, and the capital of the second delegation of the Papal States. 
It is a polished city, abounding in works of art, and worthy a 
longer stop than travellers usually give it. It is true it contains 
now but 18,000 inhabitants, but its works of art are the relics of 
the period when it could lose 100,000 by the pestilence in one 
year and still be a large city. I visited the Etruscan tombs in 
this region, and would give you a learned dissertation on them if 
I could throw any light on this intricate subject. To stand before 
the urns and mouldering mai-ble that were ancient when Rome 
stood, and Cassar was a modern, and read, or rather attempt to 
read, characters that no man can read, fills one with strange sen- 
sations. These Etruscans understood the arts, especially sculp- 
ture, and were certainly to some extent a polished race. Their 
epitaphs have reached posterity, but, alas, posterity cannot read 
them. What a comment on human fame ! The proud chieftain 
who built liim a tomb before he died, and ordered his own marble 
and epitaph, lies in the midst of his garnished sepulchre utterly 
unknown. This wise world cannot make out the letters of his 
name. If he had dreamed posterity would ever have become so 
degenerate as to be unable to read the letters of his alphabet, he 
would probably have scorned to have attempted to send his name 
and race down to it. Perugia has a Lunatic Asylum, managed 
on the modern improved system, and an excellent University. 
The fortress, called the Citadello Paolina, was begun by Pope 
Paul III., who laid w^aste a part of the town to reduce the Peru- 
gians, who rebelled against a salt-tax he levied on them. The 
first cannon was smuggled in a corn-sack, and the Perugiana 
commemorated this violation of their liberty by the couplet — 

" Giacchi cosi vuole il diavolo 
E-\^iva Papa Paolo ! " 

« Since the devil will have it so, 
Long live Pope Paul." 



188 LETTERS FROM ITALY 

The hotel where we stopped was an old palace, and in one o* 
the chambers were old armor and paintings, and relics enough to 
make a small museum, and all for sale — cheap. But the o^reat- 
est object of interest, especially to the antiquarian, is the Museum, 
from the number of Etruscan relics it contains, all of which 
are picked up in the neighborhood of the city. They have already 
collected nearly one hundred separate inscriptions, the longest 
of which contains forty-five lines. 

This city looks do^n on a most magnificent view. The valley 
of the Tiber towards Rome, is spread out in its richness and ver- 
dure, sprinkled with villages and convents : while far away, the 
beautiful Umbrian Mountains finish the surpassingly lovely land- 
scape. The Cathedral and fountain, etc., we will leave alone, 
and hasten away to get a sail on the beautiful lake of Thrasy- 
mene before sunset. The descent into the valley of Caina is 
steep, and we now see no more of the Tiber. Towards evening 
we came to a ridge of hills, from the top of which Thrasymene 
is visible. Here we were compelled to take oxen to drag us up. 
An old lofh' tower stands on the top, overgrown with i\y, and 
presenting one of the most picturesque ruins of its kind I have 
ever seen. As I stood at its base, and looked back on the valley, 
cultivated like a garden, and green as an emerald, as it lay flooded 
in the light of the setting sun, I did not wonder the Italian loved 
his country. Thrasymene is immortal, from the terrible battle 
fought on its shores, between Hannibal and the Roman Consul 
Flaminius. With Livy as a guide-book, or Hobho use's notes on 
the fourth Canta of Childe Harold, which are but little more 
than a translation from Liivj and Polybius, you can fix every 
part of the battle-field, almost as accurately as you can the local- 
ities of Waterloo. The range of mountains called the Gualandro, 
approach at two separate points close to the lake, while between, 
the land recedes away, forming an arc larger than a semicircle. 
At the two points where the mountain touches the lake, are the 
two passes that lead into this semicircular area. In the interior 
of this area, and on the side towards Rome, rises a conical hill, 
on which Hannibal stationed the main body of his troops, while 
he placed men in ambush near the pass on the farther side, 
towards Florence, through which Flaminius was to come. Be- 



BATTLE-FIELD OF THRASYMENE. 189 

fore daybreak, the Roman Consul entered this pass, without 
sending forward a single spy to ascertain either the position of the 
ground or the enemy. At the farther side he saw on the hill- 
top the Carthaginian army, and pressed on. Just then a heavy 
fog rose from the lake, and covered the Roman host, while the 
hill-tops were left in the sun light, so that Hannibal could com- 
municate with the different portions of his army unseen, and also 
detect, by the moving mist that stirred to the muffled tread of the 
fierce legions, every step of the advancing army. Hannibal's 
forces had dwindled from a hundred thousand down to twenty 
thousand, yet he had no choice but to fight or die. At a given 
signal, the men in ambush fell on the flank of the Romans, while 
Hannibal moved down on their centre. For three hours the bat- 
tle raged with such terrific fury, that neither army were con- 
scious of an earthquake that rocked under them the while. The 
tempest of passion and the shock of battle were more terriblo 
than the passing earthquake. At length Flaminius fell, strug 
gling bravely, but in vain, to retrieve his rash error ; and then 
the battle became a slaughter. The Roman legions were tram 
pled to the ground ; and a rivulet that was loaded with the car- 
casses of the slain, rolled its purple torrent to the lake, till the 
lake itself was discolored far out from the shore. From that day 
to this, for two thousand years, it has bore the name of II San- 
guineUo, or the bloody rivulet. The peasantry retain the tradition 
of the battle, and the name of Hannibal is one of terror to them. 
As I looked over that plain, smiling in all the brightness of a 
spring morning, it did not seem possible it had once shook under 
the tread of the haughty African, and been soaked with the blood 
of so many brave Romans. 

" Far other scene is Thrasymene now : 
Her lake a sheet of silver, and her plain 
Rent by no ravage save the gentle plough ; 
Her aged trees rise thick as once the slain 
Lay where their roots are " 

At evening I took a sail on this " sheet of silver," (and it is a 
sweet lake with sweeter shores.) Thinking it would be somewhat 
romantic to have my boatmen sing as they rowed, I proposed to 



390 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

have them give me a song. They refused, under the plea of in- 
ability. I should as soon have thought of a duck being unable 
to swim, as of an Italian not knowing how to sing ; so I offered 
them money. After much solicitation, and a liberal offer, they 
finally commenced — but such music ! I am not very particular 
under such circumstances, if the harmony is not as perfect as it 
would be in a full orchestra, but this was altogether too much for 
my nerves. I begged them to stop, saying, " I'll pay you just 
as much as if you sung an hour — nay, double — if you will only 
istop." 

Three beautiful islands rise out of the bosom of this lake, on 
one of which is a convent. Wishing to test the men's knowledge 
of their priests, I inquired if the monks lived there unmarried. 
" Certainly," they replied. " But," I added, " I should think they 
would be lonely." "Oh," said they, "there are people enough 
on the island, and the monks have women in plenty." " How do 
you know that ?" I inquired. " Why they have got a great many 
children on the island." " How can you tell," I asked again, 
"their children from the others ?" " Oh, hy their Ug heads. ^^ I 
laughed outright at the fellow's shrewdness. You must know the 
monks, as a general thing, have large heads, as v/ell as fat round 
stomachs, and these good Catholic fishermen knew the proverb, 
" like father like son." 

Arezzo, which lies a little off the road, is well worth a visit, if 
for nothing else than to see the house in which Petrarch was born, 
and the well near which Boccaccio placed the comic scene of To- 
fano and Monna Ghita his wife. The cathedral stands on a com- 
manding eminence, and its stained windows are probably the finest 
in the world. Their brilliant colors seem, indeed, as Vasari once 
said, to be " something rained down from heaven for the consola- 
tion of men." They have a custom here (i. e., the distinguished 
families) of putting a marble tablet over their doors, stating their 
rank and greatness. This strikes one as ostentatious, but it is very 
convenient to the traveller. 

Truly vours. 



A MAN BUILT IN A WALL. 191 



LETTER XXXIX, 

A Man built in a Wall. 

Florence, May, 1843. 
Dear E. — Leaving Arezzo yesterday later than we ought, we 
were compelled to stop for the night at a country inn, entirely 
removed from any settlement, and with no house in sight of it. 
It was growing dark as we drove up, and the lonely inn, though 
not particularly inviting, seemed preferable to the uninhabited 
road that stretched away on the farther side. Every thing was 
in primitive style ; the stables were on the first floor, at the foot of 
the stairs, leading to the second story ; and the horses slept below, 
while we slept above. As we went up we saw them standing by 
the manger, just where the bar-room should have been, quietly 
put away for the night. Having obtained some honey, my invari- 
able resort in wretched inns in Italy, I made my simple meal and 
strolled out into the moonlight to breathe the fresh air, when on the 
hills in the distance, a bonfire suddenly blazed up, before which 
dusky figures were rapidly passing and repassing. On inquiry 
I found that it was kindled in honor of an approaching festivity, 
and that music and dancing would be in the peasant's cottage 
that night. I do not know why it is, but a mirthful scene in a 
strange country among the peasantry brings back the memory of 
home sooner than anything else. There is a freshness, a sincerity 
about it, that reminds one of his childhood years, and makes the 
heart sad. It was so with me last night. Every thing was quiet 
as the moonlight on the hills, and the stillness of nature seemed 
filled with sad memories. I returned to my bed, but not to sleep ; 
tlie busy brain and busier heart drove slumber away. At 
length a feeling like suffocation came over me, and I rose and 
openec* the window and leaned out into the cool air for relief. 
All was quiet within and without. The stars were burning on 



192 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

in the deep heavens, and the moon was hanging her crescent fal 
away over the hills. The distant bonfire burned low and feebly, 
for the revellers had left it. The heavy breathing of my com- 
panion in the next room spoke of oblivion and rest, while my own 
loud pulses told how little sleep would be mine that night. Mem- 
ories came thronging back like forgotten music, and the sternness 
of the man, and the indifference of the traveller, melted away be- 
fore the feelings of the child, the son, and the early dreamer. 
As I stood looking off on the sparkling light and deep shadows of 
the uneven surface before me, suddenly from out a grotto of 
trees, came the clear voice of a nightingale. It was like the 
voice of a spirit to me, so strange and mysterious. Uncon- 
scious of any listener, it looked out from its thick curtain of 
leaves and sang on to the moon ; its wild warble was like the mur- 
mur in one's dreams, and the music seemed half repressed in 
its trembling throat. I listened as it rose and died away and 
rose again, till I felt that the sweet bird was sin^dng in its happy 
dreams. How long I listened I know not, and what the strange 
fancies that spell-bound me were, I cannot tell. ***** 
At length the morning came and we started for Florence. While 
the driver was harnessing his team, I set off on foot and walked 
on for miles, while the quietness around was disturbed only by 
the mournful cry of the cuckoo, the sure precursor of rain. We 
at length entered the Val d'Arno, and wound along its beautiful 
banks. In the distance, on the right, was the Vallembrosa, im- 
mortalized by Milton, and the convent in which he dwelt. The 
scenery changed with every turn of the river, yet it was ever 
from beautiful to beautiful. 

At length we entered the little town of San Giovanni (St* 
John), and after strolling over the cathedral, sent for the woman 
who keeps the key of the door that shuts over the withered form 
of a man cased in a side wall of the church San Lorenzo. As 
the sort of trap-door swung open, I recoiled a step in horror, for 
there stood upright, a human skeleton, perfect in all its parts, 
staring upon me with its dead eye-sockets. No coffin enclosed it — 
no mason work surrounded it, but among the naked, jagged stones, 
It stood erect and motionless. 

This church had been built centuries ago, and remained un- 



A MAN BUILT IN A WALL. 193 



touched till within a few years, when in making some repairs, 
the workmen had occasion to pierce the wall, and "struck upon thia 
skeleton. They carefully uncovered it, without disturbing its 
position or loosening a single bone. Why and wherefore I can- 
not tell, but the priests have left it to stand in the place and at- 
titude it was discovered, an object of superstitious dread, yet of 
universal interest. A narrow door has been made to swing over 
it, to protect it from injury and shield it from the eyes of those 
%vho worship in the church. The frame indicates a powerful 
man, and though it is but a skeleton, the whole attitude and 
aspect give one the impression of a death of agony. The arms 
are folded across the breast in forced resignation, the head is 
slightly bowed, and the shoulders elevated, as if in the effort to 
breathe, while the very face — bereft of muscle as it is — seems 
full of suffering. An English physician was with me, and in- 
ured to skeletons as he was, his countenance changed as he gazed 
on it, his eyes seemed riveted to it and he made no reply to the 
repeated questions I put to him, but kept gazing, as if in a trance. 
It w^as not till after we left that he would speak of it, and then his 
voice was low and solemn, as if he himself had seen the living 
burial. Said he, " That man died hy suffocation, and he was 
built up alive in that wall. In the first place, it is evident it was 
a case of murder, for there are no grave clothes, no coffin, and no 
mason work around the body. The poor civility of a savage 
was not shown here, in knocking off the points of the stones, to 
give even the appearance of regularity to the enclosure. He 
was packed into the rough wall, and built over, beginning at the 
feet. L+ is extremely difficult to tell anything of the manner of 
death, whether painful or pleasant, by any skeleton, for the face 
always has the appearance of suffering ; but there are certain 
indications about this which show that the death was a painful 
one, and caused, doubtless, by suffocation. In the first place, the 
arms are not crossed gently and quietly in the decent composure 
of death, but far over, as wdth a painful effort or by force. In 
the second place the shoulders are elevated, as if the last, strong 
effort of the man was for breath. In the thiid place, the bones 
of the toes are curled over the edge of the stone on which he 
stands, as if contracted ^x\ agony when life parted. And," con- 

10 



194 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

tinued the doctor, with true professional detail, '• he died hard, fo? 
he was a powerful man. He was full six feet high, with broad 
chest and shoulders, and strong-limbed." I knew all this before. 
for Ifclt it. There was no mistaking the manner of that man 
death. I could tell every step of the process. Doubtless there 
v/as originally some hanging, or church furniture in this part of 
tiie church, to conceal the displacement of the wall. In a daric 
nigiit the unfortunate man was entrapped, bound and brought 
into this temple, wdiere he first could be tortured to death, and 
then the crime concealed. jMen of rank v/ere engaged in it, for 
none other could have got the control of a church, and none but 
a distinguished victim would have caused such great precaution 
in the murderers. By the dim light of lamps, whose rays scarce- 
ly reached the lofty ceiling, the stones were removed before the 
eyes of the doomed man, and measurement after measurement 
taken, to see if the aperture vras sufficiently large. A bound and 
helpless victim, he lay on the cold pavement, with the high altar 
and cross before him, but no priest to shrive him. Stifling in 
pride his emotions, checking his very siglis, he strung every 
nerve for the slovv^ death he must nicet. At length tlie opening 
v/as declared large enough, and he was lifted into it. The vrork- 
man began at the feet, and with his mortar and trowel built up 
with the same carelessness he v/ould exhibit in filling any broken 
Nvall. The successful enemy stood leaning on his sword — a smile 
of scorn and revenge on his features — -and watched the face of 
the man he hated, but no longer feared. Ah, it was a vvild ef- 
fort that undertook to return glance for glance and scorn for scorn, 
when one was the conquered and helpless victim, and the other 
tiie proud and victorious foe ! It M'as slow work fitting the pieces 
nicely, so as to close up the aperture witli precision. The tink- 
lincr of the trowel on the edo-es of the stones, as it broke off iiere 
and there a particle to make them match, was like the blow of a 
hammer on the excited nerves of the half buried wretch. At 
length the solid wall rose over his chest, repressing its eflbrt to 
lift with the breath, when a stifled groan for the first tiirse escaped 
the sufferer's lips, and a shudder ran through his frame that 
tlireatened to shake the solid mass wi)ich enclosed it to pieces. 
Yet up v/ent th.e mason work till it reached the mouth, and the 



A MAN BUILT IN A WALL. 195 

rough fragment was jammed into the teeth, and fastened there 
with the mortar— "and still rose, till nothing but the pale white 
forehead was visible in the opening. With care and precision 
the last stone was fitted in the narrow space-— the trowel passed 
smoothly over it-— »a stifled groan, as if from the centre of a rock, 
broke the stillness — one strong shiver, and all w-dr, over. The 
agony had passed — revenge was satisfied, and 8. secret locked 
up for the great revelation day. Years rolled by; one after 
another of the murderers dropped into his grave, and the memory 
of the missing man passed from the earth. Years will still roll 
by, till this strong frame shall step out from its narrow enclosure 
upon the marble pavement, a living man. 

Absorbed in the reflections such a sight naturally awakens, I 
rode on, for a long time unconscious of the scenery around me> 
and of the murmur of the Arno on its way through the valley, 
But other objects at length crowded off the shadow that was on 
the spirit ; the day wore away, and at last, after ascending a long 
and weary mountain, Florence, with its glorious dome, and the 
whole vale of the Arno, rich as a garden, lay below us. Past 
smiling peasants and vine -cove r^.d wa^*"i we trotted down into the 
valley and entered the city. 

Truly yours. 



ly"^ LETT£F.,S I ROM ITAi V 



LETTER XL. 

Ameiicaa Artists in Florence, 

Florexce, 31ay. 

Dkar E. — ^We have long been accused of wanting taste and 
genius, especially in the fine arts ; and an Englishman always 
smiles at any pretension to them on our parL In his criticLsm, 
our poetry is imitation of the great bards of England ; while 
our knowledge of music is confined to Yankee Doodle and Hail 
Columbia; and our skill in architecture, to the putting up of 
steeples, school-houses, and liberty poles. It may be so, but we 
'^vill cheeiMly enter the field with him in that department of the 
fine arts, calling for the loftiest efforts of genius, and the purest 
incarnation of the sentiment of beauty in man — I mean painting 
and sculpture, especially the latter. 

There are two American artists in Florence, by the name of 
Brcvrn : one a painter, and the other a sculptor. Mr. Brown 
the painter is one of the best copyists of the age. Under his 
hand, the great masters reappear in undiminished beauty. But 
his merits do not stop here — he is also a fine composer ; and 
when the mood is on him, Sings off most spirited designs. In his 
house I have seen pieces that indicate merit of the highest order. 
I first saw Mr. Brown in the Pitti Gallery. Wandering 
through it one day with a quondam attache, to one of the continen- 
tal embassies, my friend paused before a magnificent picture, 
and introduced me to the artist as Mr. Brown of America. It 
was a copy of one of Salvator Rosa's finest pieces, and had 
already been contracted for, by a member of the English Par- 
liament, for three hundred dollars. Walking one day through 
the gallery, the Englishman was struck with the remarkable 
beauty of the copy, and immediately purchased it, though in an 
unfinished state. Thus we lose them ; and though wc possess 
fine artists, our wealthy men refuse to buy their works, a ttd they 



AMERICAN ARTISTS IN FLORENCE. 197 

go to embellish the drawing-rooms and galleries of England. 
Mr. Powers stands undoubtedly at the head of American sculp- 
tors. His two great works are Eve and the Greek Slave. Critics 
are divided on the merits of these two figures. As the mere em- 
bodiment of beauty and loveliness, the Slave undoubtedly has the 
pre-eminence. The perfect moulding of the limbs, the exquisite 
proportion and harmony of all the parts, the melancholy, yet sur- 
passingly lovely face, combine to render it more like a beautiful 
vision assuming the aspect of marble, than a solid form hewn out 
of a rock. There she stands, leaning on her arm and musing on 
her inevitable destiny. There is no paroxysm of grief, no over- 
whelming anguish, depicted on the countenance. It is a calm 
and hopeless sorrow — the quiet submission of a heart too pure 
and gentle for any stormy passion. That heart has broken it is 
true, but broken in silence — without a murmur or complaint. 
The first feeling her look and attitude inspire, is not so much a 
wish yourself to rescue her, as a prayer that Heaven would do it. 
It is beautiful — spiritually beautiful — the very incarnation of sen- 
tim.ent and loveliness. In its mechanical execution, it reminds 
one of the Appolino in the Tribune of the Royal Gallery.* 

The Eve exhibits less sentiment, but more character. She is 
not only beautiful, but great — bearing in her aspect the conscious- 
ness she is the mother of a mighty race. In all the paintings of 
Eve, she is simply a beautiful woman, and indeed I do not be- 
lieve that any one but an American or an Englishman could con- 
ceive a proper idea of Eve. Passion and beauty a Frenchman 
and an Italian can paint, but moral character, the high purpose 

* We have been told a ludicrous anecdote of this Greek slave and an ig- 
norant but wealthy American, for the truth of which we cannot personally 
vouch. An American, who had suddenly acquired great wealth by specula- 
tion, took it into his head to travel, and finding himself at length in Florence, 
made a visit to Mr. Powers' Studio. Looking over the different statues, his 
eye rested on the Greek Slave. " What may you call that are boy?" said he. 
•' The Greek Slave," replied Mr. Powers. " And what maybe the price of it?" 
continued our Yankee. "Three thousand dollars" was the answer, as the 
artist gazed a moment at the odd specimen of humanity before him. " Three 
thousand dollars .'" he exclaimed, — " you don't say so, now. Why, I thought 
of buying sometliing on you, but that's a notch above me. Why, sta tianj is 
riz, ain't it ?" 



198 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

of calm thought and conscious greatness, they have not the most 
dim conception of. Tliere is a noble Lucretia in the gallery of 
Naples — a fine Portia in Genoa, and Cleopatras by great painters 
in abundance everywhere, but not one figure that even dimJy 
shadovrs forth what the mother of mankind ought lO be. Stern 
purpose and invincible daring are often seen in female heads and 
figures by the great masters, but the simple greatness of intellect 
seldom. 

Powers' Eve is a woman with a soul as well as heart, and as 
she stands with the apple in her hand, musing on the fate it in- 
volves, and striving to look down the dim and silent future it 
promises to reveal, her comitenance indicates the great, yet silent 
struggle within. Wholly absorbed in her own reflections, her 
countenance unconsciously brings you into the same state of deep 
and painful thought. She is a noble woman — too nolle to he lost. 
We wonder this subject has not been more successfully treated 
before. There is full scope for the imagination in it : and not a 
permission, but a demand, for all that is beautiful and noble in a 
created being. It has the advantage also of fact, instead of fic- 
tion, while at the same time the fact is greater than any fiction. 

In composing this work, Mr. Powers evidently threw all the 
Venuses and goddesses overboard, and fell back on his own crea- 
tive genius, and the result is a perfect triumph. Some, even 
good critics, have gone so far as to give this the preference to the 
Venus di Medici. The head and face, taken separately, are 
doubtless superior. The first impression of the Yenus is unfa- 
vorable. The head and face are too small, and inexpressive. 
But after a few visits this impression is removed, and that form, 
wrought with such exquisite grace, and so full of sentiment, 
grows on one's love, and mingles in his thoughts, and forms for- 
ever after the image of beauty in the soul. My first exclama- 
tion on beholding it was one of disappointment, and I unhesita- 
tingly gave Mr. Powers' Eve the preference. But memory is 
more faithful to the Yenus than to the Eve. There is something 
more than the form of a goddess in that figure — there is an at- 
mosphere of beauty beyond and around it — a something intangi- 
ble yet real — making the very marble sacred. One may forget 
other statues, and the particular impression they made grows dira 



AMERICAN ARTISTS IN FLORENCE. 199 

with time, but Venus, once imaged on the heart, remains there 
forever, in all its distinctness and beauty. 

Mr. Powers told me he had thirty different females as mod'^'.Is 
for his Eve alone. She must be a rare being who would com- 
bine, in her single person, the separate attractions of thirt\^ beau- 
tiful women, and yet the artist finds her still too ugly for the per- 
fect being of his fancy, and turns away dissatisfied to his ideal 
form. If Jupiter was an artist, and Minerva sprang out of his 
forehead the living image of his idea of a perfect woman, she 
would be well worth seeing. 

Clevenger* is also a true artist. His great work is an Indian 
Chief. It is a noble figure, and shov/s conclusively that our In- 
dian wild bloods furnish as good specimens of well-knit, graceful 
and athletic forms as the Greek wrestlers themselves. He stands 
leaning on his bow, with his he-ad slightly turned aside, and his 
breath suspended in the deepest listening attitude, as if he ex- 
pected every moment to hear again the stealthy tread his ear had 
but partially caught a moment before. Clevenger is an open- 
hearted, full-souled man — w^estern in all his tastes and great char- 
acteristics — and designs to spend his life in our w^estern country. 
to let his fame grow up with its growing people. Among Clev- 

enger's minor works w^as a beautiful bust of Miss — , of New 

York, a perfect gem in its w^ay. 

I asked him what he thought an Indian would say to meet in 
the forest his statue, painted, and tricked off in savage costume. 
He laughed outright at the conception, and replied, "He would 
probably stand still and look at it a moment in suspense, and then 
excla.im"ugh^\ That would be the beginning and end of his criti- 
cism." 

Close to Clevenger's studio is that of Brown, the sculptor. He 
was also engaged on an Indian — not a warrior, or hunter, but a 
boy and a poet of the woods. Indians, among the gods and god- 
desses of Florence, were a new thing, and excited not a little 
wonder ; and it was gratifying to see that American genius could 
not only strike out a new path, but follow it successfully. 

But I forget my Poetic Indian Boy, though it is not so easy --q 

* Since dead 



200 LETTERS FRO:VI ITALY. 

_ — , _ 

forget him, for his melancholy, ihoughtfiil face haunts me like a 
vision, and I often say to myself, " I v/onder what has become of 
that dreamy boy." In it, Mr. Brown has endeavored to body 
forth his own nature, Vv'hich is full of" rausing and melancholy." 
The boy has gone into the woods to hunt, but the music of the 
wind among the tree tops, and the swa3dng of the great branche.«« 
above him, and the mysterious influence of the deep forest, with 
its multitude of low voices, have made him forget his errand ; 
and he is leaning on a broken tree, with his bow resting against 
his shoulder, while one hand is thrown behind him, listlessly 
grasping the useless arrow. His head is slightly bent, as if in 
deep thought, and as you look on the face, you feel that forest boy 
is beyond his years, and has begun too early to muse on life and 
on man. The effect of the statue is to interest one deeply in the 
fate of the being it represents. You feel that his life will not 
pass like the life of ordinary m.en. This effect, the very one the 
artist sought to produce, is of itself the highest praise that could 
be bestowed on the work. 

Mr. Brown corroborated an impression often forced on me in 
Italy, that the Italians are almost universally disproportioned in 
their limbs. The arms of opera singers had ahvays appeared 
awkwardly proportioned, which Mr. Brown told me was true, 
and that the same criticism held good of the lower limbs of both 
sexes, and that often when he thought he had found a perfect 
form, and one that indeed did answer remarkably to the standard 
of measurement considered faultless by artists, he was almost 
universally disappointed in the shortness of the limbs between tlie 
knee and ankle, tiere is a fact for our ladies, and upsets some 
of our theories of the beauty of Italian forms. J\Ir. Brown, v.iio 
has had models in both countries, declares that the ^American 
ibrm harmonizes with the right standard oftener than the Italian. 
The Italian v/omen have finer busts, which give them an erect 
and dignified appearance, and a firmer walk. 

There is a new artist just risen in Florence, who threatens to 
take the crown off from Powers' head. His name is Diapre — a 
Frenchman by extraction, though an Italian by birth. Originally 
a poor v.-Qod engraver, he designed and executed last year, un- 
iiiios^n to any body, the model of a dead Abel. Without advan- 



AMERICAN ARTISTS IN FLORENCE. 201 

cing in the usual way from step to step, and testing liis skill on 
busts, and inferior subjects, he launched off on his untried powers 
into the region of highest effort. A year ago this winter, at the 
annual exhibition of designs and statues in Florence, young 
Dupre placed his Abel in the gallery. No one had seen it — no 
one had heard of it. Occupying an unostentatious place, and 
bearing an unknown name; it was at first passed by with a cur- 
sory glance. But somehow or other, those who had seen it once 
found themselves after awhile returning for a second look, till at 
length the whole crowd stood grouped around it, in silent admira- 
tion — our own artists among the number. It became immedi- 
ately the talk of the city, and, in a single week, the poor wood 
engraver vaulted from his humble occupation, into a seat among 
the first artists of his country. A Russian princess passing 
through the city saw it, .and was so struck with its singular 
beauty, that she immediately ordered a statue, for which the art- 
ist is to receive four thousand dollars. Many of the artists be- 
came envious of the sudden reputation of Dupre, and declared 
that no man ever wrought that model, and could not — that it was 
moulded from a dead body, and the artist was compelled to get 
the afiidavits of his models to protect himself from slander. 

I regard this figure equal, if not superior, in its kind, to any 
statue ever wrought by any sculptor of any age. It is not proper, 
of course, to compare it with the Venus di Medici, or Apollo Bel- 
videre, for they are of an entirely different character. The dead 
son of Niobe, in the Hall of Niobe, in the Royal Gallery, is a 
stiff wooden figure compared to it. The only criticism I could 
utter when I first stood over it was, " Oh hoiu dead he lies /" 
There is no marble there, it is all flesh — flesh flexible as if the 
tide of life poured through it — yet bereft of its energy. The 
beautiful martyr looks as if but just slain ; and before the muscles 
became rigid and the form stiff, had been throvrn on a hill side, 
where with his face partly turned away, and one arm flung back de- 
spairingly over his head, he lies in death as natural as the human 
body itself would rest. The same perfection of design and exe- 
cution is exhibited in all the details, and the whole figure is a no- 
ble monument of modern genius. Being a new thing, and hence 
not down in the ^uide-books, most travellers have passed through 



202 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

Florence without seeing it. I was indebted for my pleasure 
to a young attache who has resided some years in the city, and 
hence is acquainted with all its objects of interest. 

Dupre is now engaged on a Cain, which is to stand over the 
Abel. It was with great difficulty I got access to it, it being 
yet in an unfinished state. This is also a noble figure, of mag- 
nificent proportions, and wonderful muscular power. He stands 
gazing down on his dead brother, terror-struck at the new and 
awful form, of death before him, his face working with despair 
and horror, and his powerful frame wrought into intense action by 
the terrible energy of the soul within. This is a work of great 
nerit, but in my estimation falling far below the Abel. The at- 
titude is too theatrical, and the whole expression extravagant and 
overwrought. 

Dupre is a handsome man, with large black eyes and < 'elan- 
choly features. 

Yours truly. 



VENUS DI MEDICI. 203 



LETTER XLI. 

Venus di Medici — Titian's Venuses— Death of a Child. 

Florence, May- 
Dear E. — I do not design to write you often from Florence, 
since the great attraction here are the paintings and statuary, and 
those cannot be written about. You wish, of course, to know 
what I think of the Venus di Medici. Like all others I am dis- 
appointed at first sight. The head and face certainly are infe- 
rior in expression and power to the rest of the figure. But the 
form itself grows on one the oftener he sees it, till it becomes a 
part of the world of beauty within, and enters into all his after 
creations. The Tribune, as it is called, or circular room, in 
which it stands, is a rare spot. A row of the choicest statuary 
surrounds it, while the walls are hung with exquisite paintings. 
The two naked Venuses by Titian, hanging behind the Venus di 
Medici, are admirably painted, but to me disgusting pictures, from 
their almost beastly sensuality. I should think Titian m.ight 
have conceived the design of them when half drunk, and took his 
models from a brothel. I have no patience with such prostitution 
of genius. The marlle Venus has something of the goddess 
about her. There is an atmosphere of purity — divinity if you 
please — surrounding it, that holds you as by a spell. 

The Flora, so called, of Titian, in another apartment of this 
gallery, is surpassingly lovely. I vv^ould give his two Venuses, 
nay, a hundred of them, for this single picture. The group of 
Niobe disappointed mo. With the exception of Niobe herself and 
her two daughters, the figures struck me as commonplace. This 
whole royal gallery is a wealth of art. It was once offered to 
Pitt for a reasonable sum, but that statesman had got England 
too deep under vv^ater already to plunge her deeper by the pur 
chase of works of art. 



201 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



In the cabinet of antique bronzes is an eagle of the 24th Ro- 
n.ian Legion. I do nut kno^v wlicn I liave seen an object that in 
terested me more. Long, long ago. when Rome was in her glory, 
it had soared aloft amid the smoke of battle and the sliock of ar- 
niies, the sign and hope of this glorious old legion, leading it on to 
victory and triumph. It had survived all vrho bore it, and, like 
the legion itself, had now sunk to rest. Its brazen wings will no 
more float over the field of the slain, nor its victorious beak baths 
itself in the blood of its foes. It is now only a relic like the tombs 
of the Csesars themselves. 

The Pitti gallery, in the Ducal Palace, is the finest collection 
of paintings in the world, but I shall not describe one — only, if 
you ever go there, inquire out a head said to be by Vandyke, be- 
cause they don't know to whom else to attribute it. Every artist 
vrill kjiow what you mean. I consider it tlie most perfect head 
and face ever painted. 

This evening I went to the •• Cascine,'' or royal farms, consti- 
tuting ti?e great public drive and promenade of Florence. The 
Duke's family were strolling around, quite at their ease, and the 
whole place was as lively as Hyde Park at 5 o'clock in the even- 
ing. I walked home by the Arno, and entering the city, wit- 
nessed one of those spectacles that are constantly intruding them- 
selves in our brighest dreams, and turning this world into a place 
of tears. As I was passing along the street, a little child hung 
playfully across the sill of a window, in the fourth story : sud- 
denly it lost its balance, and came like a flash of light to the pave- 
ment, — its delicate form crashed into one common mass by the 
blovf. The mother rushed down like a frantic creature, and snatch- 
ing it to her bosom, hurried with it into the house, while a few 
spectators gathered around the pool of blood it had left on the 
pavement. I turned away sick at heart, and thinking how little 
it took to turn this beautiful world into a gloomy prison house. 

But sauntering shortly after into a cafe, I forgot the mother, 
in the gay groups that surrounded me. Here I' met my friend 
Ferguson, a noble man, whose face always made me think bet- 
ter of my race. I afterwards crossed the Arno, and spent the 
evening with an English family, composed of some seven or eight 
in all, and intimate friends of Carlvle. The conversation turned 



ENGLISH FAMILY. 205 



on America, and I could not restrain a smile, at the queer and 
endless questions put me of our country ; though I must say, 
none of them were quite so absurd as a remark once made to 
one of my most distinguished countrywomen when in England 
Speaking of the United States, this English lady very profound- 
edly observed that the climate in our country must be delightfully 
cool in the summer, from the winds Mowing over the Cordilleras 
mountains. Most of their questions were of our Indians, and 
their forest and prairie life ; how they looked, walked, and talked, 
and what they wore. (With regard to the latter, I could have 
much better told v/hat they did not wear.) At last I went over 
their mode of v/arfare, and when I came to speak of their terrific 
war-whoop — the signal of the onset — -a sweet creature of fifteen, 
wlio had hitherto sat in perfect silence, and staring eyes, and lips 
^apart, suddenly exclaimed, " Oh ! cannot you show us how that 
war-whoop sounds ?" I stopped and thought a moment, and it 
was well I did, for the temptation was almost irresistible to send 
that excitable creature, like a startled pigeon, from her scat by a 
sudden whoop, which, whether Indian-like or not, would most 
certainly have met with a response. I had slightly learned the art, 
when a boy, from an old Indian, to whom I used to give a cent 
a whoop, just to feel m.y blood shiver, as, with his fingers rapidly 
oeating his lips, he sent that wild, wavering cry, with startling 
power along the mountains ; and I felt a most wicked desire just 
then to test my gifts. Why is it one feels at times this irresisti- 
ble impulse to do some out-of-the-way thing, just to witness its 
effect ? Just then Carlyle. v/ith his massive head, rose before 
me ; and I imagined him quietly asking me if I called that " a 
well authenticated whoop." 

Late at night I left this circle of kind friends, with whom I had 
spent many a pleasant hour in Italy, and with the full round 
moon riding over the quiet city, and throwing its silver beams on 
the waters and bridges of the Arno, turning them all into poetry 
and beauty, I passed along through the deserted streets, to the 
Piazza della Santa Crcce. The sound of my own footsteps, echoing 
amid the silent palaces ; and the glimmering moonlight, bathing 
all in its saddening beams, filled me with strange feelings, almost 



20fi LETTERS FROM ITALY". 

like forebodmgs ; and I arrived at my lodgiiigs as different a man 
from the one I was when amid my Indian battles, as if I had 
changed souls within the last half hour. Metempsychosis does 
not seem at times so strange a belief, after all. 

Truly yours. 



STROLL THROUGH FLORENCE. 207 



LETTER XLII. 

Stroll tkrough Florence — A Dominican Friar. 

Florence. 

Deae E. — The Duomo, beautiful as it is, I shall not attempt 
to describe, nor the Chapel of the Medici. Oh, what a strange 
history is that of the family of the Medici ! What bloody mur- 
ders and vice stain its greatness ! If that Pitti palace could give 
back all the revels and groans it has heard, no man would enter 
its portals. 

The gardens around Florence are beautiful, and the " Giardino 
di Boholi^' a fairy land. You can stroll for hours through it 
without satiety. Florence is livelier than most of the Italian 
towns, and I should prefer it far before any other portion of Itah^, 
as a place of residence. The custom of putting a marble tablet 
over the doors of houses, where some distinguished character 
has lived or died, saves one a deal of trouble. Thus you see 
where Dante was born — Corinna lived — Americus Vespucci — 
(the discoverer of America, as the inscription states) — made it his 
home — and last, though not least, on the hill near Galileo's tower, 
the house where the great astronomer died. 

To-day has been one of my strolling days, and I have wander- 
ed hither and thither in search of incident and new objects. In 
the morning I went to Fiesoli, perched on a hill-top, and over- 
looking the gardens of Florence and the rich plain through which 
the Arno v/inds. I forgot its Etruscan relics in the lovely view 
that was spread out below me. From this point, Florence looks 
like a beautiful picture framed in a garden, which is itself framed 
by the beautiful hills. 

Walking in the afternoon along the main street, I met Mr. 
C — — a, an Italian exile. I had not seen him since he left the 
United Slates, and did not expect to meet him here. As he recog- 



SOS LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

nizecl me. he rushed across the street, and in true Italian man- 
ner. threw his arms around my neck, and kissed both of mv 
cheeks. This being kissed by men,' and in the streets, is rather 
awkward at fiist, but one soon gets accustomed to any thing. I 
took the embrace as it was intended ; and Imowing that I stood, in 
his view, as a representative of those he loved ia America, 
having no particular claim on him myself, I distributed the kiss 
around to Ms friends, who were 7«z/ friends ; and by the time I 
got through with what I deemed a fair division, I found nothing 
remaining to my share. 

I like to have forgot the Laurentian Library, with its manu- 
scripts and illuminated missals, and I mention them now only to 
excite your cupidity over an illuminated copy of Petrarch, with 
portraits of himself and Laura, exquisitely wrought with the 
pen, and the Decameron of Boccaccio, copied by his friend, and a 
Virgil, of the earliest manuscript edition. 

I had a letter of introduction to a friar of the Dominican Order, 
in the convent of St. Mark, v\-ho sliov.cd me many things I should 
otherwise have missed. He is a literary- man, and is now en- 
gaged in a biographical sketch of the lives of the artists' of the 
Dominican order. It vrill be a valuable work. In roaming with 
him through the cloisters and library of the convent, I fell quite 
in love vrith its quietness, and ceased to wonder men could pass 
their lives in such a secluded manner. I shall ever remember 
this friar vrith pleasure and affection. He is a good man. if there 
is one on the earth. He breakfasted with m.e yesterday morning, 
and in his kindness of manner and liberality of feeling, and gentle- 
manly bearing, I forgot the light robe of his order and his faith, and 
felt for him an affection and regard I seldom entertain towards a 
comparative stranger. The cloisters of this church contain some 
remarkable frescoes, executed by a friar. They have a finish 
almost like that of a miniature painting. My English friends 
were very anxious to get a peep at these frescoes, but the rules 
forbid the introduction of ladies into the convent. My good 
fi-iend the friar presented a petition to the prior for special per- 
mission, but before it could be granted, it would be necessary to 
have it carried up to the archbishop ; and before all that process 
could be gone through with, I knew I should be on my way to 



A DOMINICAN FRIAR. 205 

Switzerland. He gave me a sly hint, however, which I was half 
a mind to act upon. Being very anxious to have the ladies see 
these frescoes, especially as they were very desirous to do so, 1 
asked him if there was no way of gaining access for them with- 
out the ceremony of a formal permit. " No," said he, " unless 
you do it without our knowledge. You can visit the convent ; and 
it sometimes happens that the door to that painting (the principal 
one, and the only one on the lower floor) is left open, and if you 
should take advantage of it and go in, we could not help it, you 
know." I understood the hint, and seeing that it came from his 
overflowing kindness and desire to grant my request, I felt un- 
bounded gratitude towards him. I saw he was willing to com* 
promise himself to please me, and would see that the door ivas 
left open in that very supposable manner. I could not expose 
such goodness to the least inconvenience, and felt that I would 
rather disappoint myself and my friends a hundred times over, 
than cause him trouble on our behalf. 

In this convent they make a peculiar kind of cordial, which 
they keep in a sort of druggist's shop close by the cloisters, and 
where a friar stands always ready to supply the purchaser. With 
this good Dominican I visited a friar artist, of his own order, whose 
studio was in one of the old cells of the convent. He stood with 
pallet in hand, dressed in the robes of his order, before a picture 
of a beautiful v/oman as I entered, which he seemed contempla- 
ting with no ordinary interest. He was a superb man in his 
physique, and in the large dark eye and jet black curling hair, 
clustering gracefully around his ample forehead, you could dis- 
cern the poet and the dreamer far more than the devout friar. 
Exquisite paintings by himself of female figures and heads, v/ere 
scattered around the room ; and I must confess, this evidence of 
the good taste of the priest increased my respeet for him every 
moment I remained in his studio. He has one of those faces I 
never forget to remotest time. His great black eyes seemed to 
look into my very soul. On my last visit to my friar friend, I took 
a cup of coffee with him in one of the rooms of the convent, and 
then bade him good bye. His farewell was unaffected, yet full 
of kindness, and he wished all blessings, present and to come, 
upon my head. God bless liim, and would there were more men 
in our world as good as he. Truly yours. 



210 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XLIII. 

Pisa — Condition of Italian Peasantry — Silver Mines — Seravezza Quarries — 
Love Scene of Peasants — Pass of the Apennines. 

Gexoa. 

Dear E. — I have skipped over many of the details of Florence, 
not because they were uninteresting to me, but because they 
would be to you. I could describe (with the help of a guide- 
book) the nr.agnificent doors of the Baptistry and the Campanile, 
and Duomo itself, but it would be only description. I had thought 
of taking a boat from Florence to Pisa, and so sail down the Arno. 
If I could have been assured pleasant weather, I should have 
done it, but two days in an open boat, and drenched with rain, 
would have quite killed the romance of the thing. 

We took a light carriage and reached Pisa before night. ]\Ia- 
king but a short stay in it, I will only say the quay along the Ar- 
no is very beautiful, and the Duomo, Baptistry, Campo Santo and 
leaning tower, standing together and rising out from the green 
field on which they are placed, form one of the most striking 
architectural viev/s I ever saw. They alone are 'worth a long 
journey to see. The road from thence to Lucca is decidedly the 
most charming one I ever travelled. Now v.'inding along stream- 
lets, and now almost embowered in the grape vines that hang along 
its margin, with no fences to mar the beauty; and now opening on 
a sweet plain — it presents a constant succession of scenes, the last 
ever seeming the most beautiful. 

Lucca itself stands in the centre of an extended plain, sur- 
rounded with a niost perfect and symmetrical wall. Its baths are 
world renowned. On my route I was struck with the improved 
character of the Tuscan peasantry compared with other parts of 
Italy. 

The peasantry of Italy, as a general thing, are more virtuous 
than the richer classes, and in many provinces do not suffer for 



CONDITION OF ITALIAN PEASANTRY. 2U 

the necessaries of life. The difference in this respect in the dif- 
ferent sections, is as great as that between the cultivated and un- 
cultivated land of those regions. Field-work, which in our coun- 
try is chiefly confined to the men, except in the slave districts, is 
here performed also by women. Wheat is usually sown in 
drills, and after it has reached a certain height is weeded out, gen- 
erally by females and boys, who pass between tlie rows with nar- 
row hoes. The peculiar costumes of the peasantry often gives 
them a very picturesque appearance in the fields. I have seen 
in the wheat fields near Naples twelve or fifteen women in a group, 
each with a napkin folded on the top of her head, to protect it 
from the sun — while the dark spencer and red skirt open in front 
and pinned back so as to disclose a blue petticoat beneath — con- 
trasted beautifully with the bright green field that spread away on 
every side. They usually go to their work in the morning with 
their distaffs in their hands, spinning as they w^alk. 

The distaff is one of those characteristics of the country jou 
meet at every turn. It is like a common distaff and held under 
the arm, while the spindle rests in the hand. The flax is pulled 
out into a tliread in the usual way, when the spindle is dropped 
and a twirl given it as it falls, so that it hangs dangling by the 
thread and twisting it as it revolves. I have often stopped of a 
bright morning and watched these picturesque groups, slowly 
sauntering along to their labor. Many of them will ask alms 
as you pass, as a mere matter of economy. To a cheerful looking 
woman who asks you for money, you cannot well refuse a few pen- 
nies. It is sought and obtained in a single minute, and yet it is 
the price of a whole day's labor. In the country between Naples 
and Rome, some parts of which are very beautiful, the wages of 
a woman in the field is a Carline, or eight cents yer day, and she 
fnds herself. One can hardly conceive how eight cents would 
buy her daily food, much less clothe and shelter her, but it is in- 
credible on what a small sum an Italian will live. Many a poor 
noble would be supremely happy could he have the income of our 
common clerks. 

Travellers who follow the main routes know little of the char, 
acter of the Italian peasantry. Around the hotels and villages 
Uiey have become contaminated by foreigners. But go back into 



212 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

the mountains and the extreme politeness and civility you meel 
at every turn endear them lo you before you are aware of it. 
Male and female salute you as you pass, and in such a pleasant 
manner that you scarcely regard yourself as a foreigner. 

Visiting the silver mines on the borders of Lucca and Carrara, 1 
v/as struck with the change of character of the lower classes 
immediately on leaving the main road. But the pleasure I re- 
ceived was soon forgotten in the sad spectacle that met me as I 
approached the mines. I never saw paler and more woe-begone 
faces than those of the females I found myself among. They 
were mostly young women, but poor, with sunken eyes, and 
colorless cheeks, and a perfect marble expression of features. 
They are employed in various departments, but chiefly in wash- 
ing silver dust. Whether it be the cold mountain water in which 
their arms are constantly bathed, or the influence of the metal 
they separate, or both, I know not — but our hard-driven factory 
girls look like rose-buds, compared to them. We went through 
the mines with the head miner, and when we left him, astonished 
him beyond measure with the present of half a dollar : " e molto 
genoroso/' said he. We had employed him but half an hour, 
and that after his day's work was done, and yet he received for 
it a whole day's wages. 

Returning from these mines just at evening we met one of those 
dandy peasants we often see painted, but seldom encounter. A 
perfect rustic Adonis with flowing locks and rosy cheeks, and 
beautiful bright and laughing eye — he had that jaunty air and 
rollicking gait which characterizes your peasant beau. Flis hat 
was set rakishly on one side, while his flashy vest and careless 
costume gave him a decidedly reckless appearance. But he was a 
handsome fellow, and as he passed us v/ith his oxen and cart he 
trolled away a careless ditty. A peasant girl stepped into the 
road that momen. and joined him, but it did not look exactly like 
a casual meeting. As they walked on side by side, he had such 
a good-for-nothing scape-grace look that 1 could not help calling 
out to him. They both looked back and laughed, when he sudden- 
ly seized her by the waist and gave her a kiss that fairly rung 
again. The blow that followed sent him half way across tho 
road and made my ears tingle in sympathy. 



SERAVEZZA QUARRIES 2ii 

The next day we went into the mountains to visit the vSeravezza 
quarry, and also the Mercury mines. These last are very un- 
profitable and dreadfully destructive of human life. Mr. Powers 
uses the Seravezza marble exclusively. Wandering amid the 
hovels, and along a mountain-stream, that disclosed at every step 
some new beauty in the stupendous scenery that enclosed me, I 
entirely lost track of my companions. Discovering at length 
they had gone to the top of the mountain to visit the highest quar- 
ries, I was fool enough to follow. But after winding up and up 
for a long time, I became confused in the multitude of paths that 
continually crossed and intersected mine. But while. I stood mid- 
way on the mountam doubtful what course to take, a young wo- 
man about eighteen years of age overtook me. She was decidedly 
pretty, with a slight and graceful form. The everlasting distaff 
was in her hand, and she spun away as she slowly ascended the 
zigzag path. I inquired the road to the quarries, she told me 
she was on her way there and would accompany me. We fell 
into a chit-chat — sustained as well as could be expected with my 
bad Italian on one side, and her miserable patois on the other. I 
asked her if she was carrying the dinner to her friends in the 
quarries. " Oh no," she replied. Ah, said, I, in true Yankee in- 
quisitiveness, I suppose you are going up to visit your husband '^ 
She burst into a clear laugh and replied, " Oh, no, I am not mar- 
ried.'' Well, then, said I in perfect wonder, what are you climb- 
ing this tremendous hill for ? " Oh, I carry quadrette,^' she an- 
swered. " Quadrette !" I exclaimed, what's that ? On inquiry I 
found that she was employed all day in bringing square blocks of 
miarbie dressed for pavements from the quarry to the plain. A 
thick napkin was folded on the top of her head, on which she 
placed the " quadrette," square pieces of marble, and descended 
with them to the manufactory below. It was a mile from the 
bottom to the top, and she spun as she ascended the mountain, 
and then returned with her " quadrette J' A mile up and a mile 
back, made each trip two miles long. She made seven a day, 
and received for each only a cent and a half. Thus she travelled 
fourteen miles a day, and carried seven miles, a heavy stone, and 
received for it ten cents. I looked at her with astonishment. Her 
features and form were delica,te, and her voice and manner and 



214 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

all were so gentle and sweet, that I could not conceive for a mo 
ment that such a life of drudgery was her lot. Yet she seemed 
cheerful and happy. The wages of the men were about twenty 
cents per day. 

Carrara, which we took on our route, is entirely engulfed in 
the mountains that furnish its marble. The day before we reached 
here we crossed the Bracco, one of the loftiest passes of the Ap- 
ennines. A tremendous storm swept over it when we passed, and 
the wind threatened at times to lift our carriage— wheels, horses, 
and all, and send us over the cliffs. The mist boiling up from 
the gulfs below, yet concealing their depth — the desolate, naked 
ridges that would now and then cleave its massive folds — the 
howling of the blast, and the deep darkness at midday, conspired 
to render it a scene of wild sublimity, and at times, of horror. 
But the approach to Genoa the next day, along the side of the 
mountain, on a road winding midway from the sea to the summit, 
fully compensated for the gloom of the day before. The vexed 
Mediterranean had subsided to a gentle swell that fell with a low 
murmur far below us, as our carriage crawled like an insect 
along the steep breast of the mountain, while far away white sails 
were skimming the blue waves as though winged with life. Af- 
ter passing through several galleries cut in the solid marble, we 
at length emerged from the last in full sight of Genoa, and the 
whole riviera between us and it. Its white palaces and towers 
at that distance, and seen through that tunnel, looked like a city 
beheld through a show-glass, rather than real stone and marble. 

Truly yours. 



KING OF SARDINIA. 215 



LETTER XLIV. 



King of Sardinia, Contempt of Him — Censorship of the Press — A Smug- 
gling Priest. 



Dear E. — I designed to stop here with my friend during the 
summer, and then, perhaps, go to Egypt and Palestine in the win- 
ter, but this climate is poison to me — and here let me say to those 
who visit Italy for their health, to ascertain well beforehand what 
ails them. For invalids of a certain character, such as those 
troubled with pulmonary affections, this climate will doubtless 
often be found very beneficial, but to dyspeptics, and those af- 
flicted with the whole tribe of nervous diseases, it is the very 
worst climate they could possibly visit. The air is too stimula- 
ting, and produces constant excitement where the very reverse is 
needed. The consequence is, that most of the Italians themselves, 
who in our country would be nervous dyspeptics, are here luna- 
tics. A sensitive nervous system cannot endure the stimulating 
air and diet of Italy. I have tried it for nearly a year, and now 
leave it sooner than I designed, and far worse than when I entered 
it. So you may expect to hear next from me at Milan. 

The King has just left the city, not particularly pleased, I 
should judge, with his reception. This traitor, and Jesuit, and 
religious bigot, and tyrant, is looked upon by the Genoese about 
as favorably as the angels look on Satan. The streets were 
filled with people, but scarcely one of the upper classes was 
among them. The Royal Palace stands on Strada Balbi, just 
above the University, and the King condescended to walk down 
the street past it. The students stood in the door and court with 
their hats on, and as his Majesty passed, coolly turned their backs 
on him. A year ago the people gave him an illumination, and 
when the nobles and authority of the city sent to know his feel- 



216 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

ings on the proposed reception, he simply returned for an an- 
swer, "the King deigns to grant the illumination." This was a 
little too much for the republican Genoese. 

But he is only a part in the tyrannical system. The censor, 
ship of the press is very strict, and is managed by three commis- 
sioners — one from the church, to look after the heresy — one from- 
the army, and one from the civil department. The wife of our 
Charge related an amusing incident of the operation of this cen- 
sorship, on a luckless young author. He had written a work for 
his own fame, and hence endeavored to steer clear of all collision 
with the censors. But unfortunately, and very probably merely 
to show that he understood a little English, he quoted two lines 
from Campbell's " Pleasures of Hope," (I quote from memory) — - 

" The earth was waste and Eden was a wild, 
And man the hermit sighed till woman smiled." 

On these t^o lines the book was condemned. It contained Eng- 
lish heresy. The poor author was thunderstruck at the result, 
and could not divine the error contained in this harmless couplet. 
But the sharp eye of the priest saw in it a stab at the celibacy of 
the clergy, and the old Jesuit was right enough. It was the sim- 
plest thing in the M'orld to prove it. If in Eden, surrounded with 
all the beauty and bloom of Paradise, the perfect Adam grew 
lonesome, and strolled around the bright walks of the garden 
sighing for a woman, how wretched must the priest be in our de- 
generate state, without one. 

There is a priest here I often walk with. One day we went 
without the city walls and strolled off towards a little settlement, 
\vhen to my surprise, he went into a butcher's shop and bought 
two pieces of meat, and stuffed them into a sort of pea-jacket he 
had put on under his priestly robe. I asked him why he came 
so far out of the city to purchase meat. " Oh," he said, " to 
save duty. There is five francs duty, for instance, on every 
calf that is brought within the walls, which makes meat very 
high." " But," I replied, *•' this is smuggling, and are you not 
afraid of being detected ?" " No," he said, " they would not 
think of searching me, and if they did, they could do no more 
than take it away from me." Conversing of other things I soon 



A SMUGGLING PRIEST. 217 

forgot all about the meat, but not so my friend, the priest. After 
we had passed the second gate and were fairly in the city, he 
stopped, and said in English, (which he was very anxious to 
speak,) " E — av escap — ed — wiv — salvation.'' Meaning he had 
got through safe. The pulpit phrase, however, in which he an- 
nounced it completely upset my gravity, and I laughed outright. 
Thinks I to myself, " Old fellow, your salvation will have to de- 
pend very much, I am afraid, on the smuggling principle at last." 

I have just been called to hasten to my friend L — — , who has 
been svddenly taken with bleeding at the lungs. 

Truly yours. 



11 



218 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XLV. 

AUessandria — Battie-Field -of Marengo — Pavia — Milan. 

Milan. 

Dear E. — -I have been four clays on tlie way to Pvlilan, in order 
to visit the battle-field of Marengo, which is a half a day's journey 
out of the way. I was struck with the care taken of the road 
over the Apennines. It is not only smooth, and in excellent order, 
but men are stationed at certain intervals during the summer 
months to wet it once a day as we do Broadwa}^, to keep the dust 
down. We should regard this at home an entire waste of labor. 

We did not arrive at Marengo in tim.e to visit the field that 
evening, so passed on to AUessandria, where we stopped over night. 
This is the strongest fortified inland place I have ever seen. 
Weil manned and provisioned, it would be impossible to take it* 
It is a singular city, and soldiers seem to form the majority 
of the population. The peasantry that come in at morning to 
sell fruit, et cetera, are a squalid-looking race. 

The field of Marengo, is not like most other modern battle 
grounds, overrun with guides, who tell you some truth and a 
good deal fable. It is left undisturbed, and not a guide can be 
found. Few visit it, and I found a written description I had in 
my pocket indispens-able. This was one of those battles where 
Bonaparte excaped, as by a miracle, utter defeat. The Austrians 
were full 40,000 strong, while Napoleon could muster but little 
more than half th^.t number. Napoleon formed three lines ; one 
in advance of Marengo at Padre Buona ; one at Marengo ; and 
one behind this little hamlet, which indeed consists of scarcely 
iviorc than half a dozen houses. The first line v/as under Gar- 
donne ; the scco;id under Victor ; and the third commanded 
by Napoleon in person. It is a broad plain, with nothing to 



BATTLE-FIELD OF MARENGO. Sl9 

intercept the charge of cavalry for miles, beside scattering trees 
and huts ; with the exception of a narrow, but deep stream, 
with a miry bottom, that passes directly in front of Marengo. 
Here Victor stood. The Austrian heavy infantry formed in the 
open field and came down on Gardonne, driving him back on 
Victor, posted on the other side of the ravine. The tiralleurs 
of both armies were ranged on opposite sides of this stream, and 
there, with the muzzles of their pieces almost touching, stood and 
tired into each other's faces and bosoms for two hours. It did 
not seem possible, as I stood by that stream, so narrow I could 
almost leap across it, that two armies could stand for that length 
of time, so close to each other, and steadily fire at each other. 
They were but a few rods apart ; and the cannon and musketry 
together, swept down whole ranks of living men. At length the 
indomitable Victor was compelled to retire before such a superior 
force, and fell back on Lannes, who was advancing to meet him. 
The two formed a second line of defence, but the furious charge 
of the Austrians drove them back; while General Elsnitz having 
marched around, attacked them on the right flank, and began to 
pour squadron after squadron of his splendid cavalry on the re- 
treating columns of Lannes. But the stern hero immediately 
formed his troops " en echelon," and retired without confusion. 
But the retreat had become general, and had the Austrian com- 
mander Melas pushed the battle here, nothing short of a miracle 
could have saved Bonaparte from utter ruin. But he thought 
the battle already won, and that it was now only a pursuit, and 
retired to the rear, weary and exhausted ; and no wonder, for he 
was eighty-four years of age. But at that moment, Desaix ap- 
peared on the field, bringing up the reserve. Desaix rode up to 
Bonaparte and said, " I think this must be put down as a battle 
lost." " I think it is a battle won," replied Napoleon ; " push on, 
and I will rally the line behind you." Riding along the army 
he had just stayed in its rapid retreat, he said, " Soldiers, we have 
retired far enough — let us now advance — you know it is my cus- 
tom to sleep on the field of battle." At that moment Desaix led 
on a fresh column of 5000 grenadiers, but at the first fire he fell 
dead, shot through the heart. " Alas ! it is no* permitted me to 
weep," said Napoleon. " On '" and they d'<^ v- sweeping line 



220 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

after line, till the whole army was routed, and the battle became 
a slaughter. The Austrian cavalry fell back on their own in- 
fantry, trampling them to the earth ; while the French horse 
charged like fire over the broken columns. The routed army 
at length reached the Bormida, and were precipitated down its 
steep banks till its stream was choked with the bodies of men 
and horses, rolled by thousands into its purple flood. 

Bonaparte's star was still in the ascendant. 

How changed was the scene as I looked upon it. The herdsman 
vas watching his herd on the quiet plain, and the careless hus- 
)andman driving his plough through the earth, once heaped 
ivith the dead. The Bormida looked as if it never had re- 
ceived a slain army in its bosom, nor its bright waters been dis- 
colored with the blood of men. 

That night we slept at Pavia, where we arrived late and 
weary, having been detained in crossing the Po. The next 
morning we took Certosa in our way. The church and buildings . 
standing alone and with no village near, present a singular, yet 
most magnificent appearance. They cover ground enough to 
hold a large village, and there is on the high altar pre- 
cious stones enough to build a dozen churches. One altar piece 
is composed entirely of the teeth of the hippopotamus. I thought I 
would describe this one church to you — built by a rich villain to 
atone for his piracies and robberies — but I believe I'll not at- 
tempt it. 

I have now been several days in Milan. The Marengo gate is 
beautiful, and so are the " Place d'Armes,'' and the promenade — 
but I have an eye only for the Cathedral ; it impresses me more 
than St. Peter's, though differently. St. Peter's is a magnifi- 
cent temple — the Milan Cathedral, a magnificent church. Its 
beautiful Gothic architecture, and its hundreds of statues on the 
outside alone, and the whole fabric of white marble, do not affect 
me so much as the solemn interior. The lofty nave, and im- 
mense columns — the setting sun streaming through its stained 
windows — and the gathering gloom of twilight, together with the 
pealing organ, have subdued me more than I thought I could be 
Bubdued by mere external causes. Every evening finds me 



MILAN. 221 



there, wandering up and down over the marble pavement, till the 
worshippers one after another disappear, and the deeper darkness 
shuts out the magnificent proportions that so charm the eye and 
the spirit. 

For effect it is superior to any Church or Cathedral I ever en- 
tered. 

Truly yours 



922 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 



LETTER XL VI. 

Character of the People. 

Milan. 

Bear E. — Perhaps you would ask me what I now think of 
Italian character. I should answer that my first impressions had 
changed very little. The Italian women I have spoken of before. 
The men are more polite than Americans, and more polished. 
They treat strangers with greater kindness, and receive them with 
truer hospitality. Friendships, too, are more frequent and warmer 
among them than with us. Indeed, I have often wondered why 
in our country, where there are such strong domestic and social 
ties, there were not closer friendships among men — they are scarce- 
ly known in the higher, purer sense. Here, on the contrary, 
friendships are constantly contracted, marked by the intensest af- 
fection and self-sacrifice. I have often watched, in my own coun- 
try, with a sort of stupid amazement, two men who had been very 
intimate in prosperity, suddenly grow quite indifferent when mis- 
fortune had overtaken one. A friend lets an unfortunate friend 
struggle on in poverty, without ever thinking of sacrificing a few 
thousand dollars, if by it he should circumscribe his own enjoy- 
ments. No one complains of the justice of this, but it certainly 
shows a want of that high generous affection, which is worth 
more to a man than money. 

There is a great deal of intellect m Italy, and a great many 
bold, decided men, but the mass cannot be relied upon. The 
Italians want the steadiness of the English, while they have not 
the headlong impetuosity of the French. Hence, they shrink 
from great emergencies, and prefer the present evils that afflict 
them, to greater evils they may encounter, in shaking off* the 
tyranny under which they groan. Yet there is courage here, if 
it could only be rightly managed. Whether Italy will ever as- 



CHARACTER OF THE PEOPLE. 223 



sume her proper place again among the nations of the earth, is 
very doubtful. If she does, she will be the first nation that has 
grown old with decay and again become regenerated. In this re- 
spect, nations follow the law of human life. If age once seizes 
upon them, they never grow young again. They must first die, 
and have an entirely new birth. Everything here is old. Cities, 
houses, churches, and all are old. The whole economy of out- 
v/ard physical life must be radically changed, to fit the spirit 
that is now abroad in the world. Italy was great in a peculiar 
age, and she cannot cope with those which are the birth of 
another age, filled with another spirit and principle of action. 
Indeed, I have no hope in the multitude of conspiracies and 
outbreaks with which Italy is filled. The struggling spirit is not 
strong enough, or at least cannot be sufiiciently combined. The 
poor and suffering have become too poor. They are beggars, that 
do not care enough for liberty to fight for it. Beside, those who 
should guide the popular will, seem to lack the steady energy 
that inspires confidence. The love of pleasure and its pursuit 
takes from the manliness of the Italian character, so necessary to 
a republican form of government. 

The northern provinces are far better in this respect than the 
southern. In Genoa, for instance, there is a great deal of nerve 
end stern republicanism remaining, which may yet recall the 
days of Spinola. Let the police over her be as lax as that ot 
Tuscany, and it would not be long before she would be a repub- 
lic again. 

The Catholic religion is most certainly losing ground here ; 
perhaps I should not say this particular form of religion, so much 
as the power of the priests. The people think more for them- 
selves than formerly, and laugh at the tricks of the priests which 
they formerly fully believed. Whatever the catechism may say, 
intelligent Catholics do not believe in the Pope's infallibility any 
more than we believe in the infallibility of our President ; and 
the multitude of friars and monks are openly scorned. There is 
a growing contempt for the v/hole priesthood, and a strong dis- 
relish to the tax which the church levies on the pocket. The 
men pay less and less attention to the public ceremonies of tha 
church, and we should call corresponding action at home seep- 



224 LETTERS FROM ITALY. 

ticism. And the inevitable result, I think, of the present form of 
religion, will be to spread infidelity. Thus, while Catholicism, 
by adapting itself to the institutions of every new country into 
which it introduces itself, gains a foothold and spreads ; it loses 
in its own land, by adhering to its old superstitions and nonsense, 
which the spirit of the age condemns. Italy is now nearly half 
infidel, and I do not believe Paris itself is more given to infi- 
delity than the very seat of his holiness — Rome. 

What this infidelity will work, is more than I can tell. 
What influence it will have on political matters, will depend on 
circumstances, which no one- can foresee or predict. But one 
thing, we think, is certain, however much the Catholic religion 
may prevail ; the Pope will constantly lose power, till his spirit- 
ual will become what his temporal throne now is, a mere shadow. 
Literature is doing something to effect a change, both in religion 
and government. Lucien Bonaparte, son of Joseph Bonaparte, 
has been instrumental in getting up the Scientific Congress of 
Milan, composed of distinguished literary men from every part of 
the Continent, which meets annually in different parts of Italy. 
It is too imposing a body to be crushed, while its discussions and 
publications give both the Pope and the petty despots of the 
provinces much uneasiness. This same Bonaparte, or Prince de 
Canino, as he is called, is doing much for liberty. With his black 
hair and moustache, black piercing eyes, and corpulent body, and 
shufiling gait, he goes about smiling to all, and beloved by all, 
while the republican principles of the French Revolution continu- 
ally prompt him to act, where he can with safety, for the redemp. 
tion of the land of his fathers. 

Truly yours. 



THE END. 



THE ALPS AND THE RHINE. 



THE ALPS 



AND 



THE E H I N E; 



A SERIES OF SKETCHES 



f TT 



HE AD LEY. 



NEW AND REVISED EDITION. 



NEW YORK: 
CHARLE S SCRIBNER, 

36 PARK ROW AND 145 NASSAU STREET. 
1862. 



Entered, according to Aet of Congreis, in the yeax 1848, by 

BAKER & SCRIBNER, 

In ttie Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 
Southern District of New York. 



THOMAS B. SMITH, STEREOTTPBR. 9* W. BENEDICT, PRINTBK, 

S16 WILLIAM STRBBT, N. Y. 16 SFRVCB STRBBT. 



E. C. BENEDICT, ESQ., 

OF NEW TORE, 

THESE SKETCHES 

ARE AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED BY 

HIS FRIEND AND RELATIVE, 

THE AUT ' 



CONTENTS. 



PAGK 

Introduction, ; vii 

Chapter I. — Pass of the Simplon, Gorge of Gondo, . ■ .1 

II. — Passes of the Forclaz and Col de Balme, . . 7 

III. — Ascent of the Montanverte, Vale of Chamounij . . 13 

IV.— Pass of the Tete Noire, 19 

v.— Baths of Leuk, 23 

IV. — The Castle of Chillon. Geneva. Junction of the Rhone 

and Arve, 26 

VII. — Freybourg Organ and Bridges. Swiss Peculiarities, . 33 

VIII. — Interlachen, Pass of the Wengern Alp, Byron's Manfred, 39 

IX. — The Grand Scheideck : an Avalanche, .... 46 

X. — Valley of Meyringen. Pass of Brunig, , . , .51 

XI. — Suwarrow's Passage of the Pragel, 55 

XII. — Macdonald's Pass of the Splugen, . . . . .60 

XIII.— The Righi Culm, 70 

XIV.— Goldau— Fall of the Rossberg, . . . : . 76 

XV. — ^Avalanches and Glaciers, their Formation and Movement, 81 

XVI. — Pasturages, Chalets, and Alpine Passes, . . . .86 

XVII.— A Farewell to Switzerland— Basle, .... 90 

XVIII.— Strasbourg— The Rhine— Frankfort, .... 94 

XIX.— A Day m Wiesbaden, 99 

sXX. — Schwalbach and Schlagenbad, 106 

XXI.— Mayence— The Rhine, . . ^ Ill 

XXII.— The Castellated Rhme, 115 

XXIII.— The Rhine from Coblentz to Cologne, . . . .121 

XXIV. — Rhine Wines, Cologne Cathedral, Louvain, Brussels, . 126 

XXV.— Battle-field of Waterloo, 131 



INTRODUCTION 



In the present work I have not designed to make a book 
of travels, but give a series of sketches of the Alpine portion 
of Switzerland, and the scenery along the Rhine. In writing 
of Switzerland, I have omitted almost altogether notices of 
the character of the people, except of those occupying the 
valleys of the Alps. Neither have I spoken of the chief cities 
and towns of the country, except to make a passing remark. 
I excluded all such matter, because I wished, if possible, to 
give a definite idea of the scenery of the Alps. Having an 
unconquerable desire from my boyhood to see the land of 
Tell and Winkelried, I had read everything I could lay hold 
of, that would give me clear conceptions of the wonderful 
scenery it embraces, yet I found that my imagination had 
never approached the reality. 

Hoping to do what others had failed in accomplishing, I 
confess, was the motive in my attempting these sketches. 
It always seemed strange to me, that such marked, stri- 
king features in natural scenery could fail of being caught 
and described. Such bold outlines, and such distinct fig- 
ures, it seemed a mere pastime to reproduce before the eye. 
And even now, of all the distinct things memory recalls, 
none appear more clear and definite than the scenes of 
the Alps. But, notwithstanding all this,. I need not add that 
I am as much dissatisfied with my own efforts as with those 
of others. The truth is, the Alps are too striking and grand 



IXTRODUCTIOX. 



to be described. We get a definite idea of very few things in 
the world we have never seen, by mere naked details. Tiiis 
is especially true of those objects that excite emotion. It is 
by comparing them to more famihar and greater things, that 
we conceive them properly. Indeed, the imagination is gen- 
erally so much weaker than the bodily eye, that exaggeration 
is required to bring up the perceptive faculties to the proper 
point. 

But the Alps have nothing beyond them — nothing greater 
with which to compare them. They alone can illustrate 
themselves. Comparisons diminisli them, and figures of 
speech only confuse the mind. This I beUeve to be the rea- 
son why every one becomes dissatisfied with his own descrip- 
tions. To give lofty conceptions of mountain scenery before, 
he has been accustomed to call it Alpine. The Alps are 
called in to illustrate all other moimtains and lofty peaks, and 
hence when he comes to describe the former, he is at loss for 
metaphors and comparisons. The words grand, awful, sub- 
lime, have been used to describe scenery so far inferior to that 
which now meets his ej^e, that he would reject them as weak 
and expressionless, were there any others he could employ. 
I have never felt the need of stronger Saxon more than when 
standing amid the chaos of an Alpine abyss, or looking off 
from the summit of an Alpine peak. Like the attempt to ut- 
ter a man's deepest emotions, words for the time shock him. 
I am aware this may be attributed to a sensitive imagination. 
Some may boast that they have stood perfectl}' tranquil, and 
It their ease in every part of the Alps. I envy not such a man 
nis self-possession, nor his tranquil nature. He who can wan- 
der through the Oberland without being profoundly moved, 
and feehng as Coleridge did when he lifted his hymn in the 
vale of Chamouni; need not fear that he will ever be greatly 



INTRODUCTION. ril 



excited, either by the grand or beautiful with which God has 
clothed the world. 

The Rhine I have passed over more hastily, and devoted 
less space to it, because its scenes are more familiar, as well 
as more tame. If I shall add to the reader's conceptions of 
Alpine scenery — give any more vivid ideas of its amazing 
grandeur, more definite outhnes to those wonderful forms of 
nature, I shall have accompUshed my purpose. My object 
in grouping, as I have, the most remarkable objects together, 
to the exclusion of every thing else, was, if possible, to do 
this. Still they must be seen to be known. 



THE ALPS AND THE RHINE 



I. 

PASS OF THE SIMPLON, GORGE OF GONDO. 

CoMmG from the warm air of the South, the first sight of the 
Alps gave a spring to my blood it had not felt for years. Egypt 
and Palestine I had abandoned, and weary and depressed, I turn- 
ed as a last resort to the Alps and their glorious scenery. As I 
came on to Lake Maggiore, I was, as we should say at home, 
" down sick." A severe cold accompanied with fever rendered 

me as indifferent to the scenery the evening I approached as 

if I were on the confines of a desert. But the morning found me 
myself again, and the clear lake coming from under the feet of 
the everlasting Alps, and peeping out into the valley as if to see 
how the plains of Lombardy looked, was as welcome as the face 
of a friend. Born myself amid mountains, I had loved them 
from boyhood. I looked out from our carriage on the Borromean 
Isles, terraced up in the form of a pyramid from the water, with 
their dark fringe of cypresses, without one wish to visit them. I 
did not care whether they were an " espece de creation,^' or " a 
huge perigord pie stuck round with woodcocks and partridges." 
The soft air revived me, and the breeze that stooped down from 
the snow summits of the Alps, that glittered far up in the clear 
heavens before me, was like a new fountain of blood opened m 
my system. I left the carriage, and wandered off to the quarries 
of pink granite among the mountains. After listening awhile to 
the clink of the miner's hammer, far upon the breast of the rock, 
and gathering a few crystals, I returned to the lake, and passing 
directly underneath a mountain of stone, from whose summit 



DOMO D'OSOLA. 



workmen were blasting rocks that fell with the noise of thunde? 
into the road, sending their huge fragments over into the lake, — • 
rejoined the carriage at a dirty inn. The crystal-like clearness 
of the water, and the mountains around, reminded me of the wild- 
er parts of the Delaware, where I had hooked many a trout, and 
thinking they ought to be found on such gravelly bottoms, I en- 
quired of the landlord if I could have trout for dinner. He re- 
plied yes, and when the speckled fish was brought on the table, it 
was like the sight of an old friend. The flesh, however, did not 
have the freshness and flavour of those caught in our mountain 
streams. It may have been owing to the cooking, probably it was. 
After dinner we started up the narrow valley that leads to the 
foot of the Simplon. It was as lovely an afternoon as ever made 
the earth smile. Gray, barren pyramids of rock pierced the clear 
heavens on either side, while the deep quiet of the valley was 
broken only by the brawling streamlet that sparkled through it. 
Here and there was a small meadow spot from which the dwarf- 
ish peasantry were harvesting the hay. Women performed the 
office of team and cart. A huge basket that would hold nearly 
as much as an ordinary hay-cock, was filled, when a woman in- 
serted heri:3lf into straps fastened to it, and taking it on her back ; 
walked away with the load. 

As it takes twelve good hours to cross the Simplon, travellers 
are compelled to stop over night atDomo D'Osola, the last village 
before the ascent commences. I will not describe the dirty town 
with its smell of garlic, nor the " red-capped," '•' mahogany-leg- 
ged," lazy lazzaroni that lounged through the street. Only one 
thing interested me in it. There is a hill near by called Calvary, 
with small white buildings stationed at intervals from the bottom 
to the top. Each of these is occupied with terra-cotta (earthen) 
figures representing our Saviour in the different stages of his suffer- 
ings ; — from the trial before Pilate, to the last agony on the cross. 
Through an iron grating I looked in upon the strange groups, 
amid which, on the earth-floor, were scattered cents and fifths of 
cents ; — thrown there by the faithful. In one, the ceiling of the 
building was concave, and painted blue to represent heaven. On 
this; angels were painted large as life, and represented as hovering 
over the suffering Christ — while they had — babies and all — white 



PASS OF THE SIMPLON, GORGE OF GONDO. 3 

handkerchiefs in their hands, which they held to their eyes quite 
a la mode. It did not strike me at first as so odd that they should 
use handkerchiefs in heaven, as that those beggarly-looking an- 
gels could afford such nice white ones. 

But the Simplon. Nature, that wore the day before, her loveli- 
est, had now put on her angriest aspect. A more glorious to-mor. 
row was never promised to man, than the sun uttered as he went 
down at evening amid the Alps. There was ,not a cloud to dim 
his brightness, v/hile the transparent atmosphere and the deep blue 
sky seemed dreaming of anything but clouds and mists. But 
who can foretell the whim of an Alpine sky ! As we entered the 
mountains the day grew dark, and from the deep gorge that pierc- 
ed their heart, the mist boiled out like the foam of a waterfall. 
Clouds veiled the giant peaks around, and the rain came down as 
if that were its sole business for the day. The torrent had car- 
ried away the road in some places, and we rolled slowly over the 
bed of the stream. At length we entered the gorge of Gondo, one 
of the most savage and awful in the Alps. This day it was ren- 
dered doubly so by the black Alpine storm that swept through it. 
The road was here squeezed into the narrowest space, while the 
perpendicular rocks rose out of sight into the rain-clouds on either 
side, and the fretting torrent struggled through its torn channel 
far below. The gallery of Gondo, cut 596 feet through the solid 
rock, opens like a cavern over this gulf. Stand here a minute 
and look down the gorge. Those perpendicular walls of nature 
pierce the heavens so high, that but a narrow strip of tossing 
clouds is visible, as the blast puffs away for a moment the mist 
that wrapped them in such close embrace. A waterfall is sound- 
ing in your ears, covering the breast of the hill with foam, and 
filling the cavern v/ith the sullen sound of thunder. Torrents 
leaping from the mountain tops, vanish in spray before they strike 
the bottom. The clouds roll through the gorge, and knock against 
the walls that hem them in ; and then catching the down-sweeping 
gust, spring over their tops, revealing for a moment the head of a 
black crag far up where you thought the sky to be, and then dashing 
over its face wrap it again in deeper gloom. All around is hor- 
ribly wild — the howl of the storm — the hissing of the blast around 
the cliffs —the r.iar of countless cataracts, ayd the hoarse voice of 



AN AVALANCHE. 



the distracted waters that rush on, and the awful solitude and 
strength that hem you in — make the soul stagger and shrink back 
in unwonted fear and awe. Nature and God seem one — Power 
and Sublimity their only attributes^ and these everlasting peaks 
their only dwelling-place. I would let the carriage, that looked 
like a mere toy among these giant forms of nature, disappear 
among the rolling mist, and then stand on a beetling crag and listen. 
It was the strangest, wildest music my soul ever bowed to, and 
the voices that spoke so loudly around me had such an accent 
and power that my heart stood still in my bosom. I grew ner- 
vous there alone, and felt as if I had not room to breathe. Just 
then, turning ray eye up the gorge, the clouds parted over a smooth 
snow-field that lay, white and calm, leagues away against the 
heavens. Oh, it was a relief to know there was one calm thing 
amid that distracted scene — one bosom the tempest could not ruf- 
fle : it told of a Deity ruling serene and tranquil above his works 
and laws. 

As we approached the summit, the snow increased in depth. 
In one place the road passed directly through an old avalanche 
cut out like a tunnel. These avalanches have paths they travel 
regularly as deer. The shape of the mountains decides the di- 
rection they shall take, and hence enables the traveller to know 
when he is in danger. They also always give premonitions of 
their fall. Before they start there is a low humming sound in 
the air, which the practised ear can detect in a moment. If you 
are in the path of avalanches when this mysterious warning is pass- 
ing through the atmosphere, you cannot make too good use of your 
legs. A few days before we passed, the diligence was broken 
into fragments by one of these descending masses of snow. As 
it was struggling through the deep drifts right in front of one of 
those gorges where avalanches fall, the driver heard this low ring, 
ing sound in the hills above him. Springing from his seat, he 
threw open the door, crying, " Run for your life ! an avalanche I 
an avalanche !" and drawing his knife he severed the traces of 
the horses, and bringing them a blow with his whip, sprang ahead. 
All this was the work of a single minute ; the next minute the 
diligence was in fragments, crushed and buried by the headlong 
mass. 



PASS OF THE SIMPLON, GOKGE OF GONDO. 5 

The top of the Simplon is a dreary field of snow and ice, gird- 
ed round with drearier rocks. The hospice is large and com- 
fortable, and does credit to its founder, Bonaparte ; and the Prior 
is a fat, very handsome, and good-natured man. I had a reg- 
ular romp with one of the San Bernard dogs, -who would run and 
leap on me like a tiger, barking furiously as he came, but harm- 
less as a kitten in his frolics. To amuse us, the Prior let out four 
of them from their confinement. No sooner did they find them- 
selves free, than they dashed down the steps of the hospice, and 
bounding into the snow, made the top of the Simplon ring again with* 
their furious barkings. After we had wandered over the build- 
ing awhile, and made enquiries respecting lost travellers in win- 
ter, the good Prior set before us some bread and a bottle of wine, 
from which we refi'eshed ourselves and prepared to depart. We 
had scarcely begun to descend towards the Vallais, when I dis- 
covered, straight down through the gorge, a little village with its 
roofs and church spire, looking like a miniature town there at the 
end and bottom of the abyss. Confident there was no place be- 
tween the top of tlie Simplon and Brieg, lying nearly twenty 
miles distant at the base, and thinking this could not be that town. 
Slink there apparently within rifle-shot of where I stood, I enquired 
of the vetturino what it was. *' Brieg," he replied. "Brieg?** 
I exclaimed : " why that is six hours' drive from here, and I can 
almost throw a stone in that place." " You will find it far enough 
before we get there," he replied, and with that we trotted on. 
Backwards and forwards, now running along the edge of a gulf 
deep into the mountains and under overhanging glaciers, till it 
grew narrow enough to let a bridge be thrown across ; and now 
shooting out on to some projecting point that looked down on shud- 
dering depths, the road wound like a snake in its difficult pas- 
sage among the rocks. Houses of refuge occur at short intervals 
to succour the storm-caught traveller ; and over the road, as it cuts 
the breast of some steep hill that shows an unbroken sheet r' 
snow, up — up, till the summit seems lost in the heavens, £ 
thrown arches on which the avalanches may slide down into ti 
gulf below. Over some of these arches torrents were now roa- 
ing from the melting mass above Calm glaciers on high, an 
angry torrents below ; white snow-fields covering thousands of 



THE VALLAIS- 



acres on distant mountain-tops, and wrecks of avalanches, crush- 
ed at the base of the precipice on which you stand ; fill the 
mind with a succession of feelings that can never be recalled or 
expressed. It seems as if nature tried to overwhelm the awe- 
struck and humbled man in her presence, by crowding scene 
after scene of awful magnificence upon him. 

We stopped at Brieg all night in a most contemptible inn,, It was 
some fete day or other of the thousand and one Catholic s?>Jnts, and 
the streets were strewed with evergreens, while nearly every second 
man had a sprig in his hat. The streets were filled with peasantry 
sauntering lazily about in the evening air, and I leaned from my 
v/indow and watched them as supper was cooking. There a group 
went loitering about singing some careless song I could not un- 
derstand, while nearer by were two peasants, a young man and 
maiden, with their arms around each other's waists, strolling silent- 
ly along in the increasing twilight. 

At Brieg you enter on the Vallais and follow the Rhone on its 
tranquil course for Lake Leman. Its waters were yet turbid 
from their long struggle in the mountains, and flowed heavily 
through the valley. Along this v/e trotted all day, and stopped 
at nio-ht at Sion. If Mount Sion in Jerusalem is not a better 
place than this, the Arabs are welcome to it. The falls of 
Tourtemagne, which you pass on the road, are very beautiful, 
from the curve and swing of the descending water, caused by the 
peculiar shape of the rocks : and those of SalJenche grand and 
striking. The long single leap of the torrent is 120 feet, and as 
you stand under it, the descending water has the appearance of 
the falling fragments of a rocket after it has burst. The spray 
that boils from its feet rises like a cloud, and drifting down the 
fields, passes like a fog over the road. 



FORCLAZ AND COL DE BALM. 



II. 

PASSES OF THE FOECLAZ AND COL DE BALM. 



From Martigny, where we arrived at noon from Sion, a rnule 
path leads over the Forclaz, from which one can look back on 
the whole valley of the Rhone, one of the most picturesque views 
in Switzerland. After following a while the route of Bonaparte's 
army, on its march from Martigny across the San Bernard, we 
turned off to the right, and began to ascend the Forclaz. Here 
I first tested the world-renowned qualities of the mule, amid the 
Alpine passes ; and I must say I did not find the one I was on 
so very trustworthy. Passing along the brink of a precipice, I 
thought he went unnecessarily near the edge; but concluding he 
knew his own business best, I let him take his own way. Sud- 
denly his hinder foot slipped over — he fell back, struggled a mo- 
ment, while a cry of alarm burst from my companions behind — ■ 
rallied, and passed on demurely as ever. For a few moments 
it was a question of considerable doubt whether I was to have a 
roll with my mule some hundred feet into the torrent below, with 
the fair prospect of a broken neck and a mangled carcase, or 
cross the Forclaz. I learned one lesson by it, however, never to 
surrender my own judgment agai-n, not even to a mule. We at 
length descended into the very small hamlet of Trient, nestled 
down among the pines. After refreshing ourselves after a most 
primitive fashion; with some plain white pine boards, nailed together 
som.ething after the manner of a workman's bench for a table, I told 
our guide I must cross the Col de Balm. He replied it was impos- 
sible. " No one," said he, " has crossed it this year except the 
mountaineer and hunter. The path by which travellers always 
cross it is utterly impassable ; not even a chamois hunter could 



A FEARFUL GUIDE. 



follow it ; besides, it rained last night, which has nriade the snow so 
soft, one would sink in leg-deep at every step, and I cannot at- 
tempt it." This was a damper, for I had thought more of making 
this pass than any other in the Alps. Still, I was fully resolved 
to do it, if it was in the reach of possibility, because from its sum. 
mit was said to be one of the finest views in the world. So walk- 
ing around the hamlet, I accosted a hardy-looking Swiss, and 
asked him if he could guide me over the Col de Balm. He re- 
plied that the ordinary route was impassable, being entirely 
blocked with snow ; but that there was a gorge reaching nearly to 
the top of the pass, now half filled with the wrecks of avalanches, 
which he thought might be travelled. At least, said he, I am 
willing to try, and if we cannot succeed, we can return. I took 
him at his word, and returning, told my friends that I was going 
to cross the Col de Balm, but that I was unwilling to take the re- 
sponsibility of urging them to accompany me, for I was convinced 
the passage would be one of great fatigue, if not of dang-'^r. I 
then called the guide, and bade him meet me with the mules 
about fifteen miles ahead, at Argentiere. He looked at me a 
moment, shook his head, and turned away, saying, " Je vous con- 
seille de ne pas aller.'' " Je vous conseille de ne pas aller.^^ I 
hesitated a moment, for my guide book said, " Always obey your 
guide," and farther on stated, that on this very pass a young Ger- 
man lost his life by refusing to obey his. I did not want to be 
rash, or expose myself unnecessarily to danger, but one of the 
finest views in the world was worth an effort; so stripping off my 
coat and vest, I bade my fearful guide good-bye, and taking a 
pole in my hand for a cane, started off. My friends concluded to 
follow. Immediately on leaving the valley we entered on the 
debris of avalanches, which fortunately bore us. It was a steady 
pull, hour after hour, mile after mile, up this pathless mass of 
snow, that seemed to go like the roof of a house, at an unbroken 
angle of forty-five degrees, up and up, till the eye wearied with 
the prospect. My friends gave out the first hour, while I, though 
the weakest of the party, seemed to gain strength the higher I 
ascended. The cold rare atmosphere acted like a powerful 
stimulant on my sensitive nervous system, rendering me for the 
time insensible to fatigue. I soon distanced mj friends, while 



COL DE BALM. 9 



my guide kept cautioning rne to keep the centre of the gorge, so 
that I could flee either to one side or the other should an avalanche 
see fit to come down just at the time I saw fit to pass. I pressed 
on, and soon lost sight of every living thing. The silent snovs^- 
fields and lofty peaks were around me, and the deep blue heavens 
bending brightly over all. I thought I was near the top, when 
suddenly there rose right in my very face a cone covered with snow 
of virgin purity. I had ascended beyond the reach of avalanches, 
and stood on snow that lay as it had fallen. I confess I was for 
a moment discouraged and lonely. Near as this smooth, track- 
less height appeared, a broad inclined plain of soft snow was to 
be traversed before I could reach it. I sat down in the yielding 
mass and hallooed to the guide. I could hear the faint reply, 
far, far down the breast of the mountain, and at length caught a 
glimpse of his form bent almost double, and toiling like a black 
insect up the white acclivity. I telegraphed to him to know if I 
was to climb that smooth peak. He answered yes, and that I 
must keep to the right. I must confess I could see no particular 
choice in sides, but pressed on. The clean drifts hung along its 
acclivities just as the wintry storm had left them, and every step 
sunk me in mid-leg deep. This was too much : I could not as- 
cend the face of that peak of snow, direct; it was too steep; and 
I was compelled to go backwards and forwards in a zigzag di- 
rection to make any progress. At length, exhausted and panting, 
I fell on my face, and pressed my hot cheek to the cold snow. 
I felt as if I never could take another step ; my breath came diffi- 
cult and thick, from the straining efforts I was compelled to put 
forth at every step, while the perspiration streamed in torrents 
from my face and body. But a cold shiver just then passing 
through my frame, admonished me I had already lain too long ; so 
whipping up my flagging spirits, I pushed on. A black spot at 
length appeared in the wide waste of snow. It was the deserted 
house of refuge, and I hailed it with joy, for I knew I was at the 
top. But, oh ! as I approached the thing, dreary enough at best, 
and found it empty, the door broken down by the fierce storm, 
and the deserted room filled with snow-drifts, my heart died with- 
in me, and 1 gave a double shiver. I crept to the windward side 
of the dismal concern to shield myself from the freezing blast, 



10 VIEW FROM COL DE BALM. 

which swept by without check, and seemed wholly unconscious 
that I had clothing on ; and crouched meekly in the sunbeams. 
But as I looked up, about and beneath me, what a wild, ruinous 
world of peaks and crags, and riven mountains, rose on my won- 
dering vision ! 

Farther on, and lo, the sweet vale of Chamouni burst on the 
sight, lying in an irregular waving line along the Arve, that glit- 
tered like a silver chain in the light of the sun. Right out of its 
quiet bosom towered away in awful majesty the form of Mont 
Blanc. Oh, what a chaos of mountain peaks seemed to tear up 
the very sky around him. The lofty " needles," inaccessible to 
any thing but the wing of the eagle, shot up their piercing tops 
over glaciers that, rolled into confusion, went streaming, an ice- 
flood, into the plains below. How can I describe this scene. It 
seemed as if the Deity had once taken the chain from his wildest 
laws, to see what awful strength they could put forth, and what a 
chaos of mountains they could tumble together. High over all, 
with its smooth round top, stood Mont Blanc, like a monarch with 
his mountain guard around him. Yet how silent and motionless 
were they all, as if in their holy Sabbath rest. No wonder Cole- 
ridge lifted his hymn in the Vale of Chamouni. Yet he should 
have looked on it from this spot. From no other point do you 
get the relative height of Mont Blanc. From the valley you look 
up, and all the peaks seem nearly of a height : but here you look 
across and see how he stands like Saul among the Israelites- 
head and shoulders above all his brethren. The great difhculty 
in standing here is, the soul cannot expand to the magnitude of 
the scene. It is crushed and overwhelmed, and almost stu- 
pified. 

I plucked some flowers that lifted their modest heads from the 
margin of the snow, and began to descend towards Chamouni 
But as I went leaping down the white slope with a shout, I sud- 
denly found myself hanging by the arms, while the dull sound of 
a torrent that swept my feet made any but pleasant music in my 
ear. I had broken through the snow crust, and catching by my 
arms, was left dangling over a stream, the depth and breadth of 
which I had no desire to measure. The sudden change from my 
headlong speed and boisterous shouts, to the meek, demure look 



SUNSET ON MONT BLANC H 

and manner with whichi I insinuated myself away from that un- 
pleasant neighbourhood, set my companions into convulsions of 
laughter. 

A cloud that came drifting along the sky caught on Mont 
Blanc, and wrapped it from my sight. Ah, thought I, good night 
to Mont Blanc! But the sweet valley was left basking in tiie 
light of the setting sun. 

Hark ! a low rumbling sound rises on the air, swelling to the 
full-voiced thunder. I turned, and lo ! a precipice of ice had 
loosened itself from the mountain, and falling over, plunged, with 
a crash that shook the hills, into the plain below. I stood awe- 
struck and silent. It was the first avalanche I had heard, and its 
deep voice echoing amid those mountain solitudes awoke strange 
feelings within me. The mass from which it had split was of a 
pale blue, contrasting beautifully with the dull white of the sur- 
rounding glacier. 

At Argentiere I found the guide and mules. Mounting, I rode 
slowly on, thinking of that Being who planned the globe, and 
heaved on high all its strong mountains, when a sudden cry from 
the guide attracted my attention. He stood pointing to Mont Blanc. 
I looked up, and to my surprise, the cloud had rained itself av/ay, 
and the top of the mountain was drawn with its bold outline 
against the clear heavens. The sun had set to me, but Mont 
Blanc was still looking down on his retiring light. And now over 
all its white form spread a pale rose colour, deepening gradually 
into a pink — the peaks around taking the same ruddy glow, while 
the giant shadows stretched their misshapen, black proportions 
over the vast snow-fields between. There they stood, a mass of 
rose-coloured snow mountains, towering away in the heavens : 
they had suddenly lost their massive strength and weight, and 
light as frost work, and apparently transparent as a rose-tinted 
shell, they seemed the fit home of spiritual beings. And then 
what serenity and silence over them all. There was none of the 
life and motion of flashing sunbeams ; none of the glitter of light 
itself on mountain summits, but a deep quiet that seemed almost 
holy, resting there, as if that rose-tinted top was bathed in the 
mellow radiance that one might dream of as belonging to a sun. 
set in heaven. My eye wandered dov/n the now ethereal forn 



12 MONT BLANC AT NIGHT. 

of Mont Blanc till it rested on a wreath of fir-ti'ees, whose deep 
green contrasted strangely with that pure rose-colour. I stood be- 
wildered — ii seemed a magic land. But the glorious vision, like 
all beauty, was as transient as the hour that gave it birth. 
Fainter and fainter again grew the tints till all passed away, and 
Mont Blanc stood white and cold and ghost-like against the even- 
ing sky. This was more than I expected to see, and what few 
travellers do see. Mont Blanc is chary of such exhibitions of 
himself. 

I lay dovv n at night with my fancy too full of wild images to 
let me sleep soundly. Feverish and restless ; at midnight I arose 
and pushed open my window. All was silent as the great shad- 
ows around, save the sound of the torrent that rolled its turbid 
stream through the valley. The moon was hanging her crescent 
over the top of Mont Blanc, that stood like a model in the clea'" 
heavens, a fit throne for the stars that seemed flashing from its 
tc^. 



MONTANVERTE VALE OF CHAMOUNI. 13 



ra. 



ASCENT OF THE MONTAWraRTE, VALE OF 
CHAMOUNI. 



The day after I made the pass of the Col de Balme I ascended 
the Montanverte to the Mer de Glace. I will not weary you 
with a description of this frequently described yet ever strangely 
wild scene. I mention it only to show the simple process by 
which an Alpine guide sometimes descends a mountain. In climb- 
ing up our zigzag path in our previous ascent, I noticed an in- 
clined plane of snow going straight up the mountain— the relics 
of the track of avalanches which had fallen during the winter 
and spring. In returning, the path came close to the top of this 
inclined plane, which went in a direct line to the path far below. 
A slide down this I saw would save nearly half a mile, so I 
sprang on to it, expecting a long, rapid, though perfectly safe de- 
scent down the mountain. But the surface was harder than 1 
supposed, and I no sooner struck it than I shot away, like an ar- 
row from a bow. I kept my feet for some time as I tacked and 
steered, or rather " was tacked and steered," straining every mus- 
cle to keep my balance, and striking my Alpine stock now on the 
right hand and now on the left ; till exhausted, I fell headlong 
down the declivity, and went rolling, over and over, till I finally 
landed, with dizzy head and bruised limbs, amid broken rocks 
at the bottom. When I had gathered up my senses, I looked 
round for my companions, and lo, there was my friend, an English 
gentleman who had started at the same time; about midway of 
the slope. As he found himself shooting off so rapidly, he 
wheeled his back dov/n the hill and fell on his hands This was 

13 



14 BLISTERED FEET. 



not sufficient, however, to arrest his progress, and he came on 
bear fashion, though at a slower rate. Despite my bruises, I lay 
amid the rocks and laughed. Our guide stood at the top, con- 
vulsed with laughter, till he saw us all safely landed, and then 
leaped on the inclined plane himself. Throwing one end of his 
Alpine stock behind him, he leaned almost his entire weight on 
it. The iron spike sinking in the ice and snow, checked the ra- 
pidity of his descent, and steered him at the same time, and he 
came to the bottom in a slow and gentle slide. So it is in this 
world : there is no man who cannot find those who will teach him 
on some points. 

When I reached the English hotel again I found I had over- 
tasked myself: I began to suspect as much before I had half 
reached the top of Montanverte. After my exhausting tramp in 
the soft snow over the Col de Balme I should have lain by a day, 
but, my toilsome day's work and wet feet both, had not left me 
any worse, but on the contrary better — so I concluded to take it 
on foot up the Montanverte. I believe I should have refused to 
ride, well or sick, when I came to know how matters stood about 
n guide and mules. We had hired a guide and mules at Martigny 
by the day ; supposing, of course, we could use them at Chamouni. 
Acting on this belief, my companions, who had resolved to ride, 
ordered out their mules ; when, to their astonishment, they were 
told that neither our guide nor our mules could be permitted to 
ascend the mountain. A Chamouni man and Chamouni mules 
must go up the Montanverte or none. This is one of the many 
niggardly, petty contrivances one meets at every turn in Switzer- 
land to wring money from the pockets of travellers. 

I should have done better to have rode even on those conditions, 
for I was completely fagged out at night, and with more bones 
aching than I before supposed I carried in me. But after tossing 
awhile on my feverish couch, I at length fell asleep. How long 
I was in the land of oblivion I know not, but I awoke to recollec- 
tion with the most vivid consciousness of possessing ten toes. 
Such exquisite pain I never before experienced. I turned and 
twisted on my couch — gathered up my legs like a patriarch to 
die — held them in my hands — but all in vain : I could think of 
nothing but torture by slow fire. Every toe T possessed seemed 



A LUNATIC. 15 



to have been converted into a taper, whxh had been lighted, and 
was slowly burnmg away. At length I could endure the agony 
no longer, and rung the bell till I waked up one of the head ser- 
vants of the house. As he knocked at the door I bade him come 
in with an emphasis that only made his entrance more studied and 
careful. " What is the matter, sir ?" he enquired in the most 
provokingly quiet tone. " Matter !" I exclaimed, as I thrust both 
feet out of the bed, " I want you to tell me what is the matter. 
You know all the strange diseases of this infamous country, and I 
want you to see what has got into my feet." He looked at 
my swollen, angry toes a moment, and replied with a most bland 
smile, " Oh, you have blistered 3-our feet — they are snow blister- 
ed." Saying this he left the room, and in a few moments return- 
ed with some brandy in a saucer, into which he dropped several 
drops of tallow from his candle, and then rubbed my feet with the 
mixture. In a few minutes I was relieved, and soon after fell 
into a quiet slumber; from which I awoke to a half-dreamy state, 
with a dim consciousness there was music around me. At length, 
clear, mellow notes of a horn came swelling on my ear. I start- 
ed up, and looking from my window, saw a shepherd driving his 
goats to their mountain pasturage. It was early dawn, and as 
the Alpine strain he blew echoed up the vale of Chamouni, I 
turned to my pillow again, while my early dreams of the land of 
the Swiss, with all the distinctness and freshness of their spring- 
time, came back on rny memory. 

1 have given the above particular account of my blistered feet, 
and their cure, for the sake of those who may make pedestrian 
excursions in the Alps. With the first symptoms of sore feet, the 
application of brandy with tallow dropped in should be made, and 
much suffering will be escaped. 

Taking one evening a stroll down the valeof Chamouni, just as 
the sun was tinging tlie Alpine summits with his farewell glories, 
I came upon one of those unfortunate beings from whom the light 
of reason has fled. Her hat was loaded down with wild flov/ers, 
and grass, and sprigs of every description, while she v/as to^dng 
v/ith a bunch of flowers she held in her hand. As I stood leaning 
against a v/all, she came up and oifered me some, talking at the 
same time in a patois made up apparently of a half dozen lan» 



16 ASCEXT 01 MONT BLAXC. 

guagcs, scarcely a word of wliich I could understand. I declined 
her liowers at first, but she pressed them on me till I took one, and 
placing it among my collection, preserved it as a memento of Cha- 
mouni. 

The register of the English Hotel is loaded down with names 
interspersed with every variety of remark, in poetry and prose ; 
some grave, some gay, some sentimental, and some comical. The 
following description of the ascent of Mont Blanc pleased me so 
Much I copied it. 

They talk of Helvellyn, Ben Lomond : all stuff! 
Mont Blanc is the daisy for me sure enough, 
For next to the Peek, in the county i\Iayo, 
It bates all the mountains or hills that I know. 
Who'd see Mont Blanc fairly must make the ascent^ 

Although owld to look up was content : 

I can tell owld T that as I mounted higher, 

For one aigle h3 saw, I found three Lammergeyer. 

I was up on the top, where, (1 tell you no lie) 

I could count every rafter that howlds up the sky. 

I wish to tell truth, and no more, tho' no less, 

And its tirrihle height to corrictly express : 

I should say if I had but a common balloon, 

I could get in one hour v/ith all aise to the moon. 

If ever you wish on that trip to set out, 

You should start from the top of i\Iont Blanc without doubt .' 

You'd find the way sure, and the chapest to boot. 

Since you'd make such a dale of the journey on fool ; 

Yet with one good, or tivo middling spy-glasses, 

You could see from Mont Blanc every action that passes. 

I per saved the last quarter quite plain through a fog, 

Growing out o^\\\e first like a great moving bog. 

In a country so subject to change, I'll be bail, 

Some hints could be got of a fair sliding scah ; 

That Peel should there go to enquire, I advise. 

For I heartily wish him a flight to the skies. 

But again to my subject : I say and repaie it, 

Mont Blanc hates all things that were ever created* 



THE LAKERS 17 



As I was determined new wonders to seek, 

I went by a route that was somewhat unique : 

By the great sea of ice, where I saw the big hole 

Where Captain Ross wintered not far from the pole : 

The Tropic of Cancer first lay on one side 

Like a terrible crevice some forty feet wide : 

Farther on I saw Greenland, as green as owld Dan, 

But " Jardin," the guides called it, all to a man. 

I didn't dispute, so we kept under weigh, 

Till we come to the ind of the great icy say, 

We saw the great mules " that congealed in a pop," 

When Saussure and Belmet would ride to the top ; 

Now nothing remains but the petrified bones, 

Which mostly resembles a pair of big stones. 

I brought my barometer, made by one Kayting, 

For fear the weather would want rigulating ; 

But the weight of the air at the top so incrased, 

That the mercury sunk fourteen inches at Jaste. 

Thin the cowld was so hot — tho' we didn't perspire — ■ 

That we made water boil without any fire. 

We fired off a gun, but the sound was so small, 

That we doubted if truly it sounded at all ; 

Which sraallness was caused (I towld my friend Harrison) 

Alone by the size of Mont Blanc in comparison. 

But to describe all the sights would require 

Not powers like mine, but genius far higher : 

Not Byron in verse, nor Scott in his prose. 

Could give the laste notion of Blanc and his snows. 

Indeed none should try it but one of the " Lakers,'^ 

Who, if not great wits, are yet great undertakers : 

And then, of all these, none could do it so well 

As the wonderful author of great Peter Bell ; 

For he to the summit could easily float 

Without walking a step — " in his good little boat." 

Next to him tlie great Southey, whose magical power 

Paints the fight of the cat in the awful mice tower ; 

Whose description in words of sublimity set, 

Says " the summer and autumn had been so wet." 



LAST NIGHT IN CHAMOUNI. 



'Tis spirits like these who are fit to attempt 
The labour from which such as I are exempt. 

Pat'k McSweeny. 

But the last night in Chamouni came ; and as I stood and leaned 
out of my wind)>i- in the moonlight, listening to the turbid Arveron 
rolling its swollen current through the vale, suddenly a dull, heavy 
sound, like the booming of distant cannon, rose on the night air. 
An avalanche had fallen far up amid the Alpine solitudes. Noth- 
ing can fill the soul with such strange, mysterious feelings as the 
sound of avalanches falling at midnight, and alone, amid the Alps. 



VIEW FROM TETE NOIRE 19 

IV. 

PASS OF THE TETE NOIRE. 



It may be from early association, or it may be that every one 
has made a hero of Mont Blanc, but there is something about 
that majestic form and those splintered pinnacles, standing like so 
many helmeted sentinels around him ; and all that prodigality of 
snow-fields and glaciers, that has left its impress on my memory 
and heart for ever. And then that strangely silent, white, myste- 
rious summit, bending its beautiful outline so far in the heavens, 
seems to be above the turmoil at its base, and apparently 
wrapped in its own majestic musings. I would have given any 
thing to have placed my feet upon it and looked down on the 
world below, but it was too early in the season to think of doing 
it — indeed, it could not be done even by the chamois hunter, for 
fresh snow had fallen every few days throughout the season. A 
French lady, delicate and pale, wept in grief that she could not 
make the ascent. 

The afternoon we mounted our mules for the Tete Noire was 
dark and overcast, and there was every appearance of an Alpine 
storm. We had scarcely left the narrow valley and entered the 
mule path among the mountains, before the blast began to sweep 
by in gusts, till the fir trees rocked and roared over our heads. 
Havir.g ascended at length above the region of trees, I turned to 
catch a last view of Mont Blanc and his glorious mountain guard 
before I entered the gloomy pass. There he stood with his snowy 
helmet on, looking down on the vast glaciers that went streaming 
into the valley below, and on the silent snow-fields stretching 
away in every direction, and around on the wild chaos of moun- 
tains that nature seemed to have piled there in some awful hurry 
of passion. The scene was indescribable, for the feelings it 



20 ALPINE STORAI. 



avrakened had no iixed character. An object of beauty would 
stand beside an object of terror. A calm and soft snow-field that 
looked in the distance as if it might be a slumbering place for 
spirits, went creeping up to as savage a cliff as ever frowned over 
an abyss; while the gentle mist, "like children gone to their even- 
ing repose," slept here and there in chasms that seemed fit onl^ 
as a place of rendezvous for the storm. Strangely wild and majes- 
tic towered away those peaks on the vision. I gazed and gazed, 
reluctant to say farewell to the wondrous scene. 

Just then, a body of mist riding the mountain blast, swept over 
us. veiling every thing in impenetrable gloom, while the rain be- 
gan to descend in torrents. Sheltering ourselves under the pro- 
jecting roof of a Swiss hut that stood a little removed from the 
path, we waited awhile for the shower to pass over, but it was 
like waiting for a river to run by — the clouds condensed faster 
and faster, and the day grew darker and darker, till sudden night 
seemed about to involve every thing. A feeling of dread crept over 
me as we w heeled out again into the rain, and turned the drooping 
and dripping heads of our mules towards the pass. I felt as if 
we were on the threshold of some gloomy fate, and I defy any 
one to keep up his spirits when hanging along the cliffs of an Al- 
pine pass in the midst of a pelting Alpine storm. We spurred 
on, however; now crawling over barren and desolate rocks, now 
shooting out on to some projecting point that balanced over a deep 
abyss filled with boiling mist, through which the torrent struggled 
up with a muffled sound, — and now sinking into a black defile 
through which the baffled storm went howling like a madman in 
his cell. As I stood on a ledge, and listened to the war of the 
elements around, suddenly through a defile that bent around a 
distant mountain, came a cloud as black as night. Its forehead 
was torn and rent by its fierce encounter with the cliffs, and it 
came sweeping dov,n as if inherent with life and a will. It burst 
over us, drenching us with rain, while the redoubled thunder 
rolled and cracked among the cliSs like a thousand cannon-shot. 
Every thing but my mule and the few feet of rock I occupied 
would be hiddeu from my sight, and then would come a flash of 
lightning, rending the robe of mist, as it shot athwart the gloom, 
revealing a moment some black and heaven-high rock ; and then 



A CRUSHED HAMLET. 21 

leaving all again as dark and impenetrable as ever. The path often 
led along the face of the precipice, just wide enough for my mule ; 
while the mist that was tossing in the abyss below, by concealing 
its depth ; added inconceivably to its mystery and terror. Thus, 
hour after hour, we toiled on, with every thing but the few feet 
of rock we occupied shrouded in vapour, except when it now and 
then rent over some cliff or chasm. I was getting altogether too 
much of sublimity, and would have gladly exchanged my certainly 
wild enough path for three or four miles of fair trotting ground. 
But in spite of my drenched state, I could not but laugh now and 
then as I saw my three companions and guide straggling along in 
Indian file, and taking with such a meek, resigned air, the rain 
on their bowed shoulders. 

As we advanced towards the latter end of the pass, I was 
startled as though I had seen an apparition. The mist, which for 
a long time had enshrouded every thing, suddenly parted over a 
distant mountain slope high up on the farther side of the gulf, and 
a small Swiss hamlet, sm.iling amid the green pasturages, burst 
on the vision. I had hardly time to utter an exclamation of sur- 
prise before it closed again as before, blotting out every thing 
from view. I could hardly believe my own senses, so suddenly 
had the vision come and departed, and stood a long time wait- 
ing its re-appearance. But it came no more — the stubborn mist 
locked it in like the hand of fate. That little eagle-nested ham- 
let, with its sweet pasturages, came and went like a flash of light- 
ning, yet so distinct was the impression it m.ade, that I could now 
almost paint it from memory. 

Reaching the lower slope of the mountain, we passed a little 
village utterly prostrate by an avalanche. The descending mass 
of snow swept clean over it, carrying away church and all. It 
looked as if some mighty hand had been spread out over the dwell- 
ings, and crushed them with a single effort to the earth. It was 
one scene of ruin and devastation; yet strange to say, though the 
avalanche fell in the night, only two or three persons were killed. 
In riding along it was fearful to see where an avalanche had 
swept, bending down strong trees, as though they were reeds, in 
its passage. 

Soaked through, worn out and depressed, I was glad when ti t 



22 TETE NOIRE. 



gloomy path around the Tete Xoire (black head) opened into day- 
light ; and the blazing pine lire that was soon kindled up in a dry 
room, \va^ as welcome as the face of a friend. The only relic I 
brought away from this pass was an Alpine rose, which my guide 
plucked from among the rocks, where it lay like a ruby amid sur- 
rounding rubbish. 

In looking over this description, I see I have utterly failed in 
giving any adequate conception of the scenery. One would get 
the impression that there was a single defile, dark and narrow, 
and nothing more. But when it is remembered that we started 
at nine, and emerged from the dark forest of Tete Noire at three ; 
one can imagine the variety of scenery that opened like con- 
stant surprises upon us. Now we would be climbing a steep 
mountain — now plunging into a dark gorge filled with boiling 
mist — now hanmnor aloncr a cliff, that in its turn hun^ over an al- 

ODD' O 

most bottomless chasm — now stretching across some sweet pastu- 
rage — nov/ following a torrent in its desperate plunge through the 
rocks, and now picking our careful way through as gloomy a 
forest as ever enclosed a robber's den. I do not know how it 
may appear in pleasant weather, but the pass of the Tete Noire 
in the midst of an Alpine storm :s not a pleasure jaunt. 



BATHS OF LEUK. 33 



V. 

BATHS OF LEUK 



In coming from the Simplon up the Vallais to Geneva, one passes 
the baths of Leuk, a little removed from the Rhone. This ham- 
let, elevated 4500 feet above the level of the sea, is shut in by a 
circular precipice that surrounds it like a mighty wall, up which 
you are compelled to climb in steps cut in the face of the solid 
rock. Its hot springs are visited during the summer months by 
the French and Swiss for their healing effects. It is something 
of a task, as one can well imagine, to get an invalid up to these 
baths. The transportation is entirely by hand, and the term-s are 
regulated by the director of the baths. These regulations are 
printed in French, and one relating to corpulent persons struck 
me so comically that I give a translation of it. 

" For a person over ten years of age four porters are necessary ; if he is 
above the ordinary weight, six porters ; but if he is of an extraordinary weight, 
and the commissary judges proper, two others may be added, but never more." 

There are some dozen springs in all, the principal one of which, 
the St. Lawrence, has a temperature of 124 deg. Fahrenheit, 
The mode of bathing is entirely unique, and makes an American 
open his eyes, at first, in unfeigned astonishment. The patient 
begins by remaining in the bath the short space of one hour, and 
goes on increasing the time till he reaches eight hours ; four before 
breakfast and four after dinner. After each bath of four hours' 
duration, the doctor requires one hour to be passed in bed. This 
makes in all ten hours per day to the poor patient, leaving him 
little time for any thing else. To obviate the tediousness of soak- 
ing alone four hours in a private bath, the patients all bathe 



»4 MANNER 01 BATHING. 

together. A large shed divided into four compartments, each 
capable of holding about eighteen persons, constitutes the princi- 
pal bath house. A slight gallery is built along the j artitions 
dividing the several baths, for visitors to occupy who wish to enjoy 
the company of their friends, without the inconvenience of lying 
in the water. This is absolutely necessary, for if eight hours 
are to be passed in the bath and two in bed, and the person 
enduring all this is to be left alone in the mean time, the life of 
an anchorite would be far preferable to it. It is solitary confine- 
ment in the penitentiary, with the exception that the cell is a 
watery one. All the bathers, of both sexes and all ages and con- 
ditions, are clothed in long woollen mantles with a tippet around 
their shoulders, and sit on benches ranged round the bath, under 
water up to their necks. Stroll into this large bathing room 
awhile after dinner, the first thing that meets your eye is some 
dozen or fifteen heads bobbing up and down, like buoys, on the 
surface of the steaming water. There, wagging backwards and 
forwards, is the shaven crown of a fat old friar. Close beside, 
the glossy ringlets of a fair maiden, while between, perhaps, is 
the moustached face of an invalid officer. In another direction, 
gray hairs are " floating on the tide," and the withered faces of 
old dames peer " over the flood." But to sit and soak a whole 
day, even in company, is no slight penalty, and so to while away 
the lazy hours, one is engaged in reading a newspaper which he 
holds over his head, another in discussing a bit of toast on a float- 
ing table ; a third, in keeping a withered nosegay, like a water- 
lily, just above the surface, while it is hard to tell which looks 
most dolorous, the withered flowers or her face. In one corner 
two persons are engaged in playing chess ; and in another, three 
or four more, with their chins just out of water, are enjoying a 
pleasant " tete-a-tete" about the delectability of being under 
Mater, seething away at a temperature of nearly 120 deg., eight 
liours per day. Persons making their daily calls on their fi iends 
are entering and leaving the gallery, or leaning over engaged in 
earnest conversation with those below them. Not much etiquette 
is observed in leave-taking, for if the patient should attempt a 
bow he would duck his head under water. Laughable as this 
may seem, it is nevertheless a grave matter, and r 9 one would 



A CURIOUS VILLAGE. 25 

submit to it except for health, that boon for which the circle of 
the world is made, the tortures of amputation endured, and the 
wealth of the millionaire squandered. The strictest decorum is 
preserved, and every breach of propriety punished by the worthy 
burgomaster with a fine of two francs or thirty-seven and a half 
cents. A set of regulations is hung against the walls specifying 
the manner with which every patient is to conduct himself or 
herself. — As specimens, I give articles 7 and 9, which will also 
be found in Mr. Murray's guide book. 

" Art. 7. Persoune ne peut entrer dans ]es bains sans etre revetue d'une 
chemise longue, et ample, d'une etofFe grossiere, sous peine de 2 fr. d'amende." 

" Art. 9. La meme peine sera encouir par ceux qui n'en entreraient pas, 
ou n'en sortiraient pas d'une maniere decente." 

Translation. Art. 7. No one is permitted to enter these baths without be- 
ing clothed in a long, ample, and thick " chemise" under the penalty of a fme 
of 2 francs. 

Art. 9. The same penalty will be incurred by those who do not enter or de- 
part in a becoming manner. 

Great care is taken that every thing should be done " decently 
and in order," and there is nothing to prevent people from beha- 
ving themselves while sitting on benches under water as well as 
above water. 

About a mile and a half from these baths is the little village of 
Albinen, perched on the top of the precipice that hems in the 
valley of Leuk on every side like a huge wall. The only direct 
mode of communication between the inhabitants of Leuk and this 
village is by a series of nearly a dozen ladders going up the face 
of the precipice. They are of the rudest kind, and fastened to 
the rock with hooked sticks. Yet the peasants ascend and descend 
them all times of the day and night and at all seasons of the year 
The females have added to their usual dress the pantaloons of the 
men. This has become so universal, that in climb Jig the momi- 
lains around, they tuck up their dresses, and appear at a little 
distance like boys. Thus do these rude peasantry, following the 
instincts of nature and modesty, c^Dmbine convenience and pro- 
priety, and retain their fashions from one generation to another. 
It is said that pantalets had their origin here. 



CASTLE OF CHILLOX 



VL 



THE CASTLE OF CHILLOX. GENEVA. JUNG 
TIOX OF THE RHONE AND ARTE. 



The night after we left ^Manigny. we slept on the shores of 
Lake Geneva, in close view of Cbillon. This Castle has become 
immortal by accident. In passing round Lake Geneva, in 1816, 
Byron got caught in a rain-storm, and remained two days in the 
little village of Ochy. in a mere hut of an inn. Having nothing 
else to do, he wrote in the mean time, " The Prisoner of Chillon," 
the characters of which poem lived only in his own imagination. 
At that time he was even unacquainted with the story of Bonni- 
rard; which might have been made the basis of a very beautiful 
poem. When he afterwards heard of it. he wrote a sonnet on the 
noble prior of Victor, in which he says : 

'•' Chill on I thy prison is a holy place, 

And thy sad floor an altar : for "twas trod 

Until its very steps have left a trace 
Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod. 
By Bonnivard ! May none those marks eSd.ce I 
For they appeal from tyranny to God.'' 

I regard the "Prisoner of ChClon" one of the most beautiful 
pieces Byron ever wrote. It has all his passion 5ind fancy, with- 
out any of his wickedness. It is tender, touching and beautiful, 
and ought to make any place immortal. Yet I confess that the 
old castle standing on a rock in the lake did not owe its chief 
charm to me from this poem. I thought of the patriot Bonni- 
vard, who suffered here for endeavouring to make Geneva free. 
A freeman, and loving freedom more than life, he withstood, 
though only Prior of St. Victor, the tyrannical Duke of Savoy and 



BONNIVARD." 27 



his own heartless Bishop. Driven from Geneva, he was betray- 
ed into the hands of the Duke, and cast into a dungeon of this 
castle, below the surface of the lake. Chained to a column of 
stone, the bold-hearted Prior passed six long years in solitary con- 
finement. The ring still remains in the pillar to which his chain 
was attached, and the solid pavement is worn in, by the constant 
tread of his feet as he paced to and fro in his dungeon. The 
only music that greeted his ear, year after year, was the low dash- 
ing of the waters against his prison walls, or the shock of the 
waves as the tempest hurled them on the steadfast castle. Year 
after year he trod the self-same spot, while the iron rusted on his 
stiffening lim.bs, and hope grew fainter and fainter round his 
heart. He struggled to free others, and got a chain upon his own 
limbs. But he had one consolation, that which cheers the mar- 
tyr in every age and in every noble cause : that was — 

" Truth crushed to earth will rise again, 
The eternal years of God are hers." 

At length, one day, as he was slowly pacing to and fro in his si- 
lent dungeon, he heard a murmur without, like the coming of a 
storm. The castle quivered on its strong foundations, but it could 
not be from the waves against its sides. He listened again ; 
there were human voices in the air, and the shout of a multitude 
shook the very rock on which he stood. A deeper paleness spread 
over Bonnivard's cheek, and then a sudden flush shot to his tem- 
ples as hope kindled in his heart. Blows are mingled with the 
shouts — the crash of falling timbers is heard — the outer gate is 
forced, and like the blast of a trumpet rings over the storm the 
name of " Bonnivard ! Bonnivaed !" Nothing can withstand 
the excited throng. Bolts and bars rend before them — the gates 
shake, totter and fall. At length they reach Bonnivard's dun- 
geon, against which blows are rained like hail stones. The mas- 
sive gate quivers and yields and falls, and a thousand v ices rend 
the very walls with the shout — ^' Bonnivard, you ari^ free !" 
What said the patriot then ? Forgetful of himself — of his own 
freedom — thinking only of his country, he cried out — 

"And Geneva?" 

" Is FREE TOO !" came back like the roar of the sea. The 



28 ROUSSEAU. 



Swiss had wrested from the baands of Charles V. of Savoy the whole 
Pays du Vaud. Chillon held out to the iist ; but besieged by 7,000 
Swiss by land, and the Genevese gallies by sea, it was at length 
talcen. It was like waking up from a dream to Bonnivard. 
When he descended into his dungeon, Geneva was subject to the 
Duke of Savoy, and was a Catholic State. When he came forth, 
Geneva was free, a republic, and professing the reformed faith. 

Byron has made free use of the poet's privilege to exaggerate, 
in speaking of the depth of the lake. He says : — 

" Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls — 
A thousand feet in depth below 
Its massy waters meet and flow : 
Thus much the fathom line was sent, 
From Ciiillon's snow-white battlement." 

A poet should never go into statistics of this sort, for other folks 
can measure as well as he, though they may not write poetry. 
There is no place in the region of the castle more than 280 
feet deep. 

I will not weary one with the mere names of the beautiful 
places and views around this sweet lake. The sentimentalist 
would talk of Clarens and Rousseau and his Julie ; the sceptic, 
of Voltaire and Ferney : but I visited neither place, having no 
sympathy with the morbid, sickly, and effeminate sentimentality 
of the one, or with the heartless scoffing wit of the other. The 
garden in which Gibbon finished his history of Rome is shown at 
Lausanne. He first conceived the idea of his history while sit- 
ting on a broken column in the Coliseum, and ended it on the 
banks of Lake Geneva. He says : " It was on the day or rathei 
the night of June, 1787, between the hours of eleven and twelve, 
that I wrote the last line of the last page, in a summer-house in 
my garden. After laying down my pen, I took several turns in 
a berceau or covered walk of acacias, which commands a pros- 
pect of the country, the lake, and the mountains. The air wag 
lemperate, the sky was serene, the silver orb of the moon was re- 
flected from the waves, and all nature was silent." This re- 
markable passage throws open the feelings of the inner man at 
*he close of his arduous work. Is it not strange that a man of 



GIBBON. d^ 



such intellect and sentiment should see no God in history or na- 
ture ? In the ruins of Rome at his feet, surmounted every where 
by tlie cross, he could see nothing but the work of human pas- 
sions and human cunning. So in the placid lake, smiling in the 
moonlight ; and in tiie towering Alps folding their mighty summits 
away on the nightly heavens, he could behold nothing but the as- 
pect of nature. To him the world had no plan or purpose, and 
the busy centuries no mission or meaning. The heavens and the 
earth were a mere poem — the history of man a short episode — 
and both an accident. How a man with such views could give 
himself up to the contemplations Gibbon did, and escape suicide, 
is a mystery to me. I could not live in such a planless, aimless 
creation. Give me no steady centre to these mighty mutations — • 
no stable throne amid these rocking kingdoms and shaking orbs — 
no clear and controlling mind to this wild chaos of ideas and pas- 
sions — no great and glorious result to all this mysterious and aw- 
ful preparation, — and Reason herself would become as wild and 
confused and aimless as they. A great mind, without a God, is 
to me the most melancholy thing in the universe. 

Lake Geneva lies in the shape of a half-moon with the horns 
curved towards the South, and is the largest lake in Switzer- 
land, being 55 miles long. It has one strange phenomenon. In 
different parts of it, but more frequently near Geneva, the water 
suddenly rises, at times, from two to five feet. It never remains 
in this position more than 25 minutes, when it again falls back to 
its original level. These are called seiches, and the only expla- 
nation given of them is the unequal pressure of the atmosphere 
on the surface at different times. This, however, is mere con- 
jecture. 

But the shores constitute the beauty of Lake Geneva. Sloping 
down to the water's edge, covered with villas, villages, and culti- 
vated fields, and hallowed by such sweet as well as stirring asso- 
ciations, it seems more like a dream-land than a portion of our 
rough earth. There is an atmosphere, an influence, a something 
around it that takes the heart captive at once, and the lips will 



' Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake 
With the wild world I dwell in, is a thing 



30 CALVIN 



Which warns rae, v.'ith its stillness, to forsake 
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring : 
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing 
To waft me from destruction ; once I loved 
Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring 
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved 
That I with stern delights should e'er have been thus moved. 

It is the hush of night, and all between 
Tiiy margin and the mountains, dusk yet clear. 
Mellowed and mingled, yet distinctly seen, 
Save darkened Jura, whose capt heights appear 
Precipitously steep ; and drawing near 
There breathes a living fragrance from the shore 
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
Drops the light di'ip of the suspended oar, 
Or chirps the grasshopper one good night carol more. 

At intervals some bird from out the brakes 
Star's into life a moment, then is still ; 
There seems a floating whisper on the hill. 
But that is fancy, — for the starlight dews 
All silently their tears of Icve instil, 
Weeping themselves away." 

i'et quiet and dreamy as these shores appear, stern practical 
men have lived upon them, and the name of Calvin goes down 
with that of Geneva and Switzerland in the history of the world. 
Calvin and Rousseau ! what a strange connection ; yet they are 
linked together in the history of Geneva. The church still stands 
v>'here the itinerant preacher and foreigner first thundered forth 
his denunciations against the dissolute tov/n. Elevated to the 
control of the republic, he was just the man to sway its turbulent 
democracy. Stern, fearless, and decided, he marked out his 
course of policy, and made every thing brnd to it. Take even 
some of the most arbitrary of his enactments, and they show the 
clear-sightedness of the man. Among them we find that only 
five dishes were allowed for a dinner to ten persons. Plush 
breeches were forbidden to be worn ; violation of the Sabbath 
was punished by a public admonition from the pulpit, and adul- 
tery with death ; while the gamester was exposed in the pillory, 
with a pack of cards suspended round his neck. These thinga 



JUNCTION OF THE RHINE AND ARVE. 31 

awaken a smile or sneer in these more liberal days, but whoever 
shall write the last history of republics will prove that such ap- 
parently bigoted enactment:^, sprung out of the clearest practical 
wisdom. A republic without tiie severity of Puri an manner, I 
believe impossible for any length of time ; that is while men are 
<>o depraved they will use their liberty for the gratification of their 
passions. The (so called) "straight-laced Puritan" is, after all, 
the only man v>lio knows anything of the true genius of a repub- 
lic among men such as we find them. Calvin and Rousseau ! 
which, after all, was the true republican ? the sentimental dream- 
er or the stern Presbyterian ? These two names stand in Geneva 
like great indexes, pointing out the characters of the 30,000 per- 
sons who annually pass through it, by showing which way their 
sympathies flow. One portion looks on Calvin to sneer, the other 
on Rousseau to sigh. 

The deep blue tint of the waters of the Rhone as it leaves the 
lake has often been commented upon. As it rushes under the 
bridges of the town, it looks as if a vast quantity of indigo had 
been emptied into it, tinging it as I have seen water in no other 
part of the world. About a mile and a half from town, this stream 
of '• heavenly dye" receives the turbid waters of the Arve into its 
bosom. The Arve is a furious stream, and comes pouring down 
from Mont Blanc, loaded with the debris of the mountains, till 
it looks like a river of mud. When the clear blue Rhone first 
meets this rash innovator of its purity, it refuses to hold any com- 
panionship with it, and retires in apparent disgust to the opposite 
bank, and for a long way the waters flow on with the separating 
line between the muddy white and pellucid blue, as clearly drawn 
as the shore itself. But the Arve finally conquers, and fuses all 
its corrupt waters into the Rhone, which never after recovers its 
clearness till it falls into the sea. I followed the bank along 
for some distance, watching with the intensest interest this strug- 
gle between corruption and purity. There was an angry, rash, 
and headlong movement to the turbid Arve, while the stainless 
waters of the Rhone seemed endeavouring, by yielding, to escape 
the contagious touch of its companion. What a striking emblem 
of the steady encroachment of bad principles and desires when 
once admitted into the 'aeart, or of the corrupting influence of 



32 JUNCTION OF THE RHINE AND ARVE. 

bad companionship on a pure mind. The Arve, for the tim? 
being, seemed endowed with consciousness, and a feeling of 
anger involuntarily arose within me at its unblushing effrontery 
in thus crowding back the beautiful Rhone from its own banks, 
and forcing it to receive its disgusting embrace. The world is 
^uU of histories of which the Rhone and Arve are the type. 



FREYBOURG ORGAN. 33 



YII. 



FREYBOURG ORGAN AND BRIDGES.- SWISS 
PECULIARITIES. 



Nothing strikes the traveller more than the peculiar customs 
attached to the separate cantons of Switzerland. Although bor- 
dering on each other, and each but a few miles across, yet they 
retain from generation to generation their own peculiar dress and 
money. The traveller becomes perfectly confused with the latter. 
The dress of the female peasantry is not only dissimilar in the dif- 
ferent cantons, but odd as it well can be. In one, the head-dress 
will be an immensely broad-brimmed straw hat, without any per- 
ceptible crown ; in another a man's hat ; in a third a diminutive 
thing perched on the top of the head ; and in a fourth a black 
crape cap, with wings on either side projecting out like huge fans. 
The latter you find in Freybourg, and this reminds me of the two 
magnificent wire bridges in the town itself, and the immense or- 
gan. The latter has 7800 pipes, some of them 32 feet long, and 
64 stops. It is an instrument of tremendous power, and though 
the traveller is compelled to pay eleven francs to hear it on a week- 
day, it is worth the money. At first, one imagines a trick is 
played upon him, and that a full orchestra accompanies the or- 
gan. The mellow tones melt in and float away with the heavier 
notes, as if a band of musicians were playing out of sight. Many 
refuse to believe it is not a deception till they go up and examine 
every part of the instrument. The efTect is perfectly bewildering. 
There is the trombone, the clarionet, the flute, the fife, and ever 
and anon, the clear ringing note of the trumpet. The perform- 
ance is closed with an imitation of a thunder storm, in which the 
wonderful power of the instrument is fully tested. At first you 



84 THE TWO SUSPENSION BRIDGES. 

hear the low distant growl swelling up, and then slowly d^'ing 
away. The next peal breaks on ll)e ear with a more distinct and 
threatening sound. Nearer and nearer rolls up the thunder-cloud, 
sending its quick and heavy discharges through the atmosphere, 
till clap follows clap with stunning rapidity, rolling and crashing 
through the building till its solid arches tremble as if the real 
thunders of heaven were bursting overhead. I did not dream 
that a single instrument could possess so much power. 

There are two suspension bridges in Freybourg ; one remark- 
able for its great length, the other for its extreme beauty. The 
latter connects the top of two mountains, swinging over a fright- 
ful gulf that makes one dizzy to look down into. There are no 
buttresses or mason-work in sight at a little distance. Shafts are 
sunk in the solid rock of the mountains, down whicb the wires that 
sustain it are dropped. There it stretches, a mere black line near- 
ly 300 feet in the heavens, from summit to summit. It looks like 
a spider's web flung across a chasm ; its delicate tracery show- 
ing clear and distinct against the sky. While you are looking at 
the fairy creation suspended in mid-heaven, almost expecting the 
next breeze will waft it away, you see a heavy wagon driven on 
it. You shrink back with horror at the rashness that could trust 
so frail a structure at that dizzy height. But the air-hung cob- 
web sustains the pressure, and the vehicle passes in safety. In- 
deed, weight steadies it, while the wind, as it sweeps down the 
gulf, makes it swing under you. 

The large suspension bridge is supported on four cables of iron 
wire, each one composed of 1,056 wires. As the Menai bridge of 
Wales is often said to be longer than this, I give the dimensions 
of both as I find them in Mr. Murray : Freybourg, length 905 
feet, height 174 feet, breadth 28 feet ; Menai, length 580 feet, 
heiglit 130 feet, breadth 25 feet. A span of 905 feet, without any 
intermediate pier, seems impossible at first, and one needs the tes- 
timony of his own eyes before he can fully believe it. 

But to the customs of the Swiss. I do not speak of them here 
because I have witnessed them all thus far on my route, or in any 
part of it, but because they seem to fill out a chapter best just 
here. Of some of these customs I speak as an eye-witness — of 
others simply as a historian. There is one connected with edu- 



THE ALP HORN. 35 



cation which exerts a wonderful influence on society. In the 
large towns the children of similar age and sex are gathered to- 
gether by their parents in little societies called societies des dinian- 
dies. T.hese little clubs are composed of twelve or fourteen chil- 
dren, selected by the parents with a view to their adaptedness to 
amuse and benefit each other. They meet in turn at the houses 
of the difTerent parents every Sabbath evening. Their nurses are 
with them, and the time is spent in amusements common to chil- 
dren. As they grow older these amusements are combined with 
instruction. This kind of intimacy creates strong friendships 
which last long after they are dispersed and scattered over the 
world, and even through life. Girls thus linked together in child- 
hood retain their affection in maturer life, and even in womanhood 
distinguish each other by the tender appellations of ^^ ma mignon- 
ne" ^^ mon coRur,^^ ^'-mon ange."" This is one great reason why 
Swiss society is so exclusive, and it is so difficult for a stranger 
to press beyond its mere fornialities. The rank of the husband 
in Switzerland depends altogether upon that of his wife. Imme- 
diately on their marriage he steps into her rank, be it above or 
below that which he formerly occupied. 

There has been much written about Swiss melodies; and the 
custom of singing in the open air, in that clear high falsetto is 
singularly wild and thrilling. The cow herds and dairy maids 
seem never weary of mingling their voices together in the clear 
mountain air of the Alps. The effect of it on the traveller is of- 
ten astonishing. Southey, in speaking of it, says, " Surely the 
wildest chorus that was ever heard by human ears : a song not 
of articulate sounds, but in which the voice is used as a mere in- 
strument of music, more flexible than any v/hich art could pro- 
duce ; sweet, powerful and thrilling beyond description." The 
Alp horn, which is merely a tube of wood five or six feet long, 
bound about with birch bark, is capable of the most melodious 
sound, when softened and prolonged by the mountain echoes, I 
ever heard. 

Nothing in my boyhood captivated my imagination more than 
the custom which was said to prevail in Switzerland, of the peas- 
antry calling out to each other, as the last sunlight left the highest 
Alpine peak, — " Praise the Lord." But it loses some of its poe. 



S( VESPERS IX THE ALPS, 



try heard on the spot. It is confined to the more rude and pastoral 
districts in tlie Catholic cantons. Having no church near to ring 
the accustomed vesper bell, its place is supplied by the Alp horn. 
A cowherd stationed on the highest peaks reclines along some 
rock, and as the golden sunlight leaves the last heaven-piercing 
snow. summit, he utters through his mellow horn the first five or 
six notes of the psalm commencing '•' Praise ye the Lord." The 
strain is caught up and prolonged by the mountain echoes and 
answered from other distant peaks, till the soul-thrilling cadences 
seem to die away on the portals of heaven. The tonesof the horn 
are indescribably sweet and subduing, awaking all the dormant 
poetry of a man's nature. But the custom which once seemed to 
me to be the very embodiment of religion and poetry together, ap- 
peared, after all, a very business-like and prosaic matter. It be- 
ing necessary to carry out the Catholic observance, a horn is sub- 
stituted for the vesper bell, which one hears ringing every evening 
in Catholic countries for the same purpose. There is just as 
much religion in the call of the muezzin from the minaret of some 
Moslem tower, v.hich one hears at every turn in Turkey. Nay 
this very custom, which has been more spoken of, more poetized, 
perhaps, than all others, prevails in some parts of our own country. 
I remember being in my grown-up boyhood once in an Indian 
missionary station of the Methodist denomination, where a similar 
expedient was adopted. Strolling at evening along the banks of 
a stream, I suddenly heard the prolonged blast of a horn sou.nJ- 
ing very much like a dinner horn. Its long continuance at that 
time of night awakened my curiosity, and on inquiring the cause 
of it, I was informed it was to call the Indians to prayer meeting. 
A conch shell had supplied the place of a bell. Bending my own 
steps thither, I arrived just in time to find a low school-house 
crowded with dusky visages, while the whole m^ultitude was sing- 
ing at the top of their voices " Old ship Zion." Here was the 
Alpine custom on which so much sentiment has been expended, 
but combined with vastly more sense and religion. 

At the sound of this vesper bell, alias Alp horn, the peasants 
uncover their heads, and falling on their knees repeat their even- 
mg prayers, and then shut up their cattle and retire to theif 
homes. 



RANZ DES VACHES. 37 

The " Ranz des Vaches," which is commonly supposed to be a 
single air, stands in Switzerland for a class of melodies, the lite- 
ral meaning of which is coio-rows. The German word is Kurei- 
hen — rows of cows. It derives its origin from the manner the 
cows march home along the Alpine paths at milking time. The 
shepherd goes before, keeping every straggler in its place by the 
tones of his horn, while the whole herd wind along in Indian file 
obedient to the call. From its association it always creates 
home-sickness in a Swiss mountaineer when he hears it in a for- 
eign land. It is said these melodies are prohibited in the Swiss 
regiments attached to the French army because it produces so 
many desertions. One of the ^' Eanz des Vaches^' brings back to 
his imagination his Alpine cottage — the green pasturage — the 
bleating of his mountain goats — the voices of the milk-maids, and 
all the sweetness and innocence of a pastoral life ; till his heart 
turns with a sad yearning to the haunts of his childhood and the 
spot of his early dreams and early happiness. 

The Swiss retain their old fondness for rifle shooting, and there 
is annually a grand riflle match at some of the large towns, made 
up of the best marksmen in all Switzerland. There are also 
yearly contests in wrestling called Zwing Feste, the most distin- 
guished wrestlers at which are from Unterwalden, Appenzel and 
Berne. Goitre and Cretinism prevail in some parts of the Alps 
to a fearful extent, and have prevailed for ages if we can believe 
Juvenal, who asks — 

" Qiiis tumidum guttur miratur in Alpibus ?" 

Goitre, it is well known, is a swelling of the thyroid gland or ad- 
joining parts in front of the neck. It increases with years and 
hangs down on the breast in a most disgusting and shocking man- 
ner. The painful spectacle almost destroys one's pleasure in 
travelling in many parts of the Alps. Cretinism inhabits the 
same localities, and is still more painful, for it affects the mind. 
The limbs become shrivelled and shrunk, the head enlarged, and 
the afflicted being an idiot. He sits in the sun all day long, and 
as you approach clamours piteously for money. Dr. McClelland 
made experiments over a territory of more than a thousand square 
miles, to test the effect of certain localities on this disease. Mr, 

14 



36 GOITRE CRETINIM. 



Murray quotes from him the following statement showing the pro- 
portion between the healthy and sick : as the result of his obser- 
vation, 

Granite and gneiss — goitre 1-500 ; cretins none. 

Mica slate and hornblende slate — goitre none ; cretins none. 

Clay slate — goitre 1-136; cretins none. 

Transition slate — goitre 1-149 ; cretins none. 

Steatic sandstone — goitre none ; cretins none. 

Calcareous rock — goitre 1-3 ; cretins 1-32. 

Thus it is seen that low and moist places are more subject to 
these diseases, w-hile the high and dry portions are comparatively 
exempt. Confined vallies and ground frequently overflowed are 
also unfavorable localities. The goitre is hereditary, but does 
not make its appearance till puberty. It is more common among 
the females than males. 

How singular it is that among the most glorious scenery on the 
earth, we find man subject to a disease that deforms him the most. 
And what is still more singular, it is among the most beautiful 
vallies in all the Alps that the inhabitants are peculiarly subject 
to these diseases. Thus beauty and deformity go hand in hand 
over the world. 



SCENERY ABOUT INTERLACHEN 3a 



YIIL 



INTERLACHEN, PASS OF THE WENGERN ALP, 
BYRON^S MANFRED. 



Intehlachen is as sweet a valley as ever slept in the bosoiT. of 
nature. At a little distance from it, Lake Thun, with its placid 
sheet of water, stretches up towards Berne, serving as a mirror to 
the snow-peaks of Stockhorn, Wiesen, Eigher and Monch, that 
rise in solemn majesty from its quiet shore. An English yacnt 
has been turned into a steamboat, whose tiny proportions remind 
one more of a slender model in a toy-shop than a real practical 
steamboat. 

Interiachen seems out of the world, and its retired position and 
magnificent scenery have- converted it into an English colony: for 
two-thirds of the sum.mer visitors are Englishmen. All the 
houses seem " pensions" or boarding houses, and with their white- 
Vv^ashed walls and large piazzas burst on you at every step from 
amid the surrounding trees. Set back in the bosom of the Alps, 
with the Jungfrau rising in view — its endless rides and shaded 
walks make it one of the sweetest spots in the world. And then 
in summer, the contrast between th.e richly clad visitors that swarm 
it in every direction, and the rustic appearance of the peasantry 
and the place itself, make it seem more like a dream-land. Near 
by are the ruins of the castle of Unspunnen, the reputed resi- 
dence of Manfred. Standing as it does in the very midst of the 
scenery in which that drama is laid, Byron doubtless had it in 
mind when he wrote it. Near by, in the quiet valley, there are 
every year gymnastic games among the peasantry, such as wrest- 
ling, })ilching the stone, &c. These games owed their origin to 
a touching incident in the history of Burkhard, the last male de- 



40 THE GORGE OF LUTSCHIXE. 

ecendant of the family who owned the castle. A young knight 
belonirinn- to the court of Berchtold of Zahrino-en fell in love with 
Ida, tlie only daughter of the proud Burkhard ; but as a deadly^ 
feud had long subsisted between the two families, the old baron 
sternly refused his consent to the marriage. The result was that 
the young Rudolph scaled the castle walls one night, and, carry- 
ing off the willing Ida, made her his bride. A bloody war com- 
menced, which was carried on without advantage to either party. 
At length, one day, as the old baron was sitting moodily in his 
room, pondering on his desolate condition, the door gently opened, 
and young Rudolph and Ida stood before him, holding their beau- 
tiful and fair-haired boy by the hand. Without attendants, alone 
and unarmed, they had thrown themselves in simple faith, on the 
strength of a father's love. The silent appeal was irresistible. 
The old man opened his arms, and his children fell in tears on 
his bosom. He received them into his castle, made Rudolph heir 
1.0 his vast possessions, and said, " Let this day be forever cele- 
brated among us." Rustic games w^ere established in conse- 
quence, and now, wdth every return of the day, tlie sweet valley 
of Interlachen rings with the mirth of the mountaineer. 

It was a dark and gloomy morning when we started for Lau- 
terbrunnen. An Alpine storm swept through the valley, and the 
heaving, lifting clouds buried the snow-peaks around in impene- 
trable mist, leavincr only the black bases in sio-ht. The rain 
fell as if the clouds themselves were falling. 

In the midst of this storm we plunged into the savage gorge of 
the Lutschine, and entered upon a scene of indescribable gran- 
deur and gloom. Perpendicular cliffs rose on each side, against 
which the angry clouds were dashing in reckless energy, wliile 
the black . torrent of the Lutschine went roaring by, flinging its 
spray even to our carriage wheels. As v,e emerged into the val- 
ley of Lauterbrunnen, a peasant girl came to the side of the car- 
riage, with a little basket of strawberries in her hand, and trotted 
along by our side, singing one of those strangely wild Alpine 
chorusses, made doubly so by the clear, ringir.g falsetto tone in 
which they are sung. At Lauterbrunnen we breakfasted in a 
cold room. I ate with my cloak on, stopping now and then to 
warm my hands over the tea-pot. Suddenly a burst of sunlight 



FALLS OF STAIBACH. 41 

told us the storm had broken. A general " hurra !" hailed the 
cheering omen, and in a moment al] was bustle and preparation 
for a march over the Wengern Alp. 

Nearly 20 miles were before us, and to be made at the rate 
of about two and a half miles per hour. I let my companions 
march on, while I paid a hasty visit to the falls of Staubach, 
(dust-fall) so named because the water, falling from the height 
of 800 or 900 feet, is dashed into mist before it reaches the bot- 
tom. It comes leaping right over the top of the mountain in its 
bold, desperate plunge for the valley. Byron, in describing it, 
says, " The torrent is in shape, curling over the rock, like the 
tail of a white horse streaming in the wind ; such as it might be 
conceived would be that of the pale horse on which Death is 
mounted in the Apocalypse. It is neither mist nor water : but 
something between both. Its immense height gives it a wave or 
curve — a spreading here and a condensation there — wonderful 
and indescribable." After getting pretty well soaked in its 
spray, I plucked a blue flower near its foot, and turned to join 
my companions, who were now slowly winding up the opposite 
m.ountain in a narrow mule-path, that seemed itself to have a 
hard struggle to master the bold hill. Up and up we panted, 
now rejoicing in the clear sunlight, and now drenched in rain as 
a cloud dashed over us. Reaching at length a long slope of pas- 
turage land, I ran to the edge of a precipice and looked down on 
the valley of Lauterbrunnen, now dwindled to a green ditch — and 
across on Staubach, that seemed merely a silver thread dangling 
over the rock. The echo of the woodman's axe came at intervals 
across the valley, whose shining steel I could see through my 
glass, coming down for a second blow ere the sound of the first 
could reach me. 

Pressing slowly up the ascent, my steps were suddenly arrest- 
ed by one of the sweetest, clearest tones I ever heard. Rich, 
mellow and fiil], it rose and fell in heart-piercing melody along 
the mountain. It was the Alpine horn. This instrument, which 
I have described before, is a great favourite of the Swiss. A 
young mountaineer lay stretched on a rock, across which the 
horn rested, and saluted us as we approached witli one of the 
wildest vet softest strains I ever listened to. He had selected a 



42 THE ALP-HORN. 



spot where the eclio was the clearest and the longest prolonged, 
and I stood in perfect raptures as the sound was caught up by 
peak after peak, and sent back in several distinct echoes. Long 
after the mountaineer had ceased blowing would the different 
peaks take up the simple notes and throw them onward, refined 
and softened till it seemed like a concert of unseen beings breath- 
ing their mellowest strains in responsive harmony. I looked oa 
those awfully wild precipices that scoffed the heavens with their 
jagged and broken summits, with increased respect every m.o- 
ment, from the sweet rich tones they were thus able to send back. 
But I must confess they were the roughest looking choristers I 
ever saw perform. It seemed really a great feat to make such 
music, and I thought I would try my skill ; so putting my mouth 
to the instrument I blew away — Heavens ! what a change ! — 
every mountain seemed snarling at me, and the confused echoes 
finally settled down into a steady growl. I gave back the horn 
to the young mountaineer, while the peaks around suddenly fell 
fifty per cent, in my estimation. 

A July sun pretended to be shining, but we soon after came 
on fresh snow that had fallen the night before. Byron pelted 
Hillhouse on this spot with snow--balls — I pelted my guide, though 
the poor fellow had not the faintest idea, as he dodged and ducked 
his head to escape the balls, that I was making him stand as rep- 
resentative of Hillhouse. Before us rose the Jungfrau, clothed 
with snow of virgin purity from the base to the heaven-piercing 
summit. A deep ravine separates the path of the traveller from 
the mountain, which from its colossal size so destroys the effect 
of distance, that although miles intervene, it seems but a few 
rods off. 

Reaching the chalet near the summit, we stoppq^ to rest and 
to hear the roar of avalanches, that fell every few minutes from 
the opposite mountains. I wish I could convey some idea of the 
stupendous scenery that here overwhelms the amazed spectator. 
Look up and up, and see the zenith cut all up with peaks, white 
as unsullied snow can make them, while ever and anon ado« n 
their pure bosoms streams the reckless avalanche, filling these 
awful solitudes whh its thunder, till the heart stops and trembles 
in the bosom. I never before stood so humbled in tiie presence 



WONDERFUL ECHO. 43 

j>f nature. Sometimes you would see the avalanches as they 
rushed down the mountain, and som.etimes you caught only their 
roar, as they fell from the opposite side of some cliff, into a gulf 
untrod by foot of man or beast. 

Byron says, in his journal of the view from the summit, " On 
one side our view comprised the Jungfrau with all her glaciers, 
then the Dent d'Argent, shining like truth ; then the little giant 
and the great giant ; and last, not least, the Wetterhornr Heard 
the avalanches falling every five minutes nearly. The clouds 
rose from the opposite valley curling up perpendicular precipices, 
like the foam of the ocean. of hell during springtide — it was white 
and sulphury, and immeasurably deep in appearance." 

The keeper of the chalet had a small Mortar, which he fired 
off at our request. Ten distinct echoes came back. From deep 
and awful silence these innumerable peaks seemed aroused into 
sudden and almost angry life. Report after report, like the rapid 
discharge of a whole bank of artillery, thundered through the clear 
air. At length the echoes one by one sunk slowly away, and I 
thought all was over. Fainter and fainter they grew till nothing 
but a low rumbling sound was heard in the distance, when sud- 
denly, without warning or preparation, there was a report like the 
blast of the last trumpet. I instinctively clapped my hands to my 
ears in affright. It came from the distant Wetterhorn, and rolled 
and rattled and stormed through the mountains, till it seemed as 
if every peak was loosened from its base, and all were falling and 
crushing together. It was absolutely terrific. Its fearful echo 
had scarcely died away before the avalanches which the sudden 
jar had loosened began to fall. Eight fell in almost as many 
minutes. The thunder of one blended in with the thunder of 
another, till one continuous roar passed . along the mountains. 
The tumult ceased as suddenly as it commenced and the deep 
and awful silence that followed was painful ; and my imagination 
painted those falling masses of snow and ice as half-conscious 
monsters, crushed to death in the deep ravines. 

But every flight has its fall ; and I was brought back to mat- 
ters of fact most effectually by the very respectful request of the 
man who fired the mortar for his pay. On asking how much he 
demanded I found that the avalanches had cost a trifle over three 



44 VIEWS FROM THE WEXGERX ALP. 

cents apiece, to say nothing of the echoes and the hurly burly in 
general. This was getting them dirt cheap, and I burst into a 
laugh that might have started another avalanche witiiout any 
great violation of avalanche principles. 

But, seriously, this multiplication and increased power of a 
single echo was something entirely new to me, and I could not 
have believed it possible had I not heard it. Speaking of it af- 
terwards to a German professor, he remarked that the same thing 
once happened to him in the Tyrol. He was travelling with an 
English nobleman, and had come to a quiet lake amid the moun- 
tains on the shores of which the nobleman sat dropping pebbles 
into the clear water and watching their descent to the bottom. 
The professor had heard of the wonderful echo in this spot ; so, 
carefully drawing a pistol from his pocket, he suddenly fired it 
behind the Englishman. The report that followed was like the 
breaking up of the very foundations of nature. The nobleman 
clapped his hands to his ears and fell on his face, thinking an 
avalanche was certainly upon him. 

About two miles from this chalet is the summit of the pass, 
6280 feet above the level of the sea, or his/her than the hi^^hest 
mountain in the United States ; — while around rise peaks seven 
thousand feet higher still. The view from this spot is indescri- 
bable. The vrords '•' sublime,'' '- grand," •' awful,*' &c. cease to 
have a meaning here to one who has applied them to so much 
less objects. The mind reaches out for words to express its emo- 
tions and finds none. The Jungfrau or Virgin — now no longer 
virgin since a few adventurous feet have profaned the pure white 
summit — the Monch — the Great and Little Eighers, or giants, and 
peaks innumerable tear up the heavens on every side, while a 
mantle of snow is wrapped over all. Glaciers cling around these 
heaven high peaks and go streaming in awful splendour into the 
cavities between, where they flow out into icy seas from which 
the sunbeams flash back as from ten thousand silver helmets. 
On this spot, amid this savage and overwhelming scenery, Byron 
says he composed a part of his Manfred. It is his own soliloquy 
as he gazes upward, that he puts in the mouth of Manfred. 

" Ye toppling crags ol ice — 
Ye aralancbes, whom a breath draws down 



MANFRED. 45 



In mountainous o'erwhelming, come and crush me ! 

I hear ye momently above, beneath, 

Crush with a frequent conflict, but ye pass 

And only fall on things that still would live ; 

On the young flourishing forest, or the hut 

And hamlet of the harmless villager. 

Tiie mists boil up around the glaciers ; clouds 

Rise curling fast beneatl me, white and sulphury 

Like foam from the roused ocean of deep hell." 

There is no work of the fancy here, no creation of the poet — it 
is simple description — the plain English of what passes before 
the traveller who stands here in early summer. The av/ful si- 
lence that follows the crash of an avalanche adds tenfold sub- 
limity and solitude to the Alps. 

After having gazed our fill we mounted our animals and began 
to descend. But the snow-crust would give way every few steps, 
when down would go horse and rider. After having been thrown 
two or three times over the head of my animal, I picked myself 
up for the last time, and with the sullen unamiable remark that he 
might take care of himself, made my way on foot. Coming at 
length to solid ground I looked back to see how he got along, and 
could not but laugh at the sorry figure he cut in the snow. The 
crust would»bear him for several steps, when down he would go 
to his girth. Extricating himself with great care he would step 
gingerly along with nose close to the surface and half crouched 
up as if he expected every moment another tumble. His ex- 
pectations I must say were seldom disappointed; till at length 
when he came to where I stood he looked as meek and subdued 
as a whipped hound. 

Mounting, we rode away for the valley of Grindelwald. 



46 VALLEY OF GRINDELWALD. 



IX. 

THE GEAND SCHEIDECK: AN AVALANCHE. 



The little valley of Grindelwald received us as we descended 
the Wengern Alp. Before entering it, as we passed down the 
mountain, up to our hips in snow, one of those picturesque scenes 
which so often occur in Switzerland burst upon us. From a 
deep valley directly beneath us, smiling in all the freshness of 
summer vegetation, came the tinkling of hundreds of bells. The 
green pasturage was literally covered with herds of cattle, and 
flocks of goats. All around, rose the gigantic snow peaks and 
hung the fearful precipices, while there on that green secluded 
spot was the complete impersonation of repose and ;juiet. The 
music of those countless bells rung and mingled in the clear 
mountain air in endless variations, and were sent back by the giant 
peaks, redoubled and multiplied, till there was a perfect storm of 
sound. As I passed down through the snow, the echoes grew 
fainter and fainter, till the mountains held them all in their own 
bosom — yet that scene of quietness and beauty has left its im- 
pression forever on my heart. 

As I descended into the valley of Grindelwald, and saw the 
brown huts sprinkled all over the distant slopes, I felt how hard 
it must be to conquer Switzerland. When an army had wound 
over the narrow and difficult pass, and driven back the hardy 
mountaineers, and burned up their homes, still they had not con- 
quered them. Hid amid hollows and fastnesses, unknown to their 
enemies, they could put them at defiance forever. 

While tea was preparing, I walked through the valley and past 
ihe parsonage, into which the minister and his two daughters 



A GLACIER. 47 



were just entering, from iheii evening wallc. Tiie valley lay in 
deep shadow, while the last sunbeams still lingered on a distant 
glacier, that shone like burnished silver in the departing light. 
That sweet parsonage, in that quiet spot, amid the everlasting 
Alps and the roar of its torrents and avalanches, seemed almost 
beyond the reach of heart-sickening cares and disappointments. 
I grew weary of my roving, and felt that I had found at last one 
spot out of human ills. Just then, I remembered that the pastor 
and his two daughters were clad in deep mourning. " Ah !" I 
sighed, as I turned away, " death has been here, turning this 
quiet spot into a place of tears. He treads an Alpine valley with 
as firm a step and unrelenting a mien as the thronged street; 
and man may search the world over, and he will only find at last" 
a spot on which to grieve." 

While at tea, three peasant girls came into the room and began 
one of their Alpine choruses, in that high, clear falsetto you hear 
nowhere but in Switzerland. These chants are singularly wild 
and thrilling, and in the present instance were full of sweetness ; 
but their effect was lost the moment I remembered it was all done 
for money. 

The day had been one of toil, and the night was disturbed and 
restless. Unable to sleep, I rose about midnight and looked out 
of my window, and lo ! the moon hung right over a clear, cold 
glacier, that seemed almost within reach of my hand. The silent, 
white and mighty form looked like a monster from 'the unseen 
world, and I fairly shuddered as I gazed on it. It seemed to hang 
over the little hamlet like a cold and silent foe. In the morn- 
ing, I went under it. These masses of ice melt in the summer, 
where they strike the valley, and the superincumbent weight 
presses down, urging up rocks and earth that no power of man could 
stir. This slowly descending glacier had done its share of this 
work, and had thrown up quite a hill, where it had plunged its 
mighty forehead in the earth ; but had encountered in its passage one 
rock that seemed a mere projection from the solid stratum below, 
and hence could not be moved. The glacier had therefore 
shoved slowly over it, leaving a cave running from the foot up to 
where the rock lay imbedded in it. I entered this cave, and the 
green and blue roof was smooth as polished silver, while a pool ai 



4S AX AVALAXCHE. 



the bottom, acting as a mirror to this mirror, perfectly bewildered 
the eye in looking into it. 

There are two glaciers that descend entirely into the valley, 
and push their frozen torrents against the bosoms of the green 
pasturages. Their silvery forms fringed with fir trees, while 
their foreheads are bathed in the green meadow below, furnish 
a striking contrast to the surrounding scenery. One can ascend 
for nearly four miles along the margin of the lower glacier on 
his mule, and will be amply repaid for the trouble. It was on 
this glacier that the clergyman of Vevay, M. Mouron, was lost 
— the account of which is in almost every book of travels. It 
W"as supposed at first that his guide had murdered him ; but after 
twelve days search his body was found at the bottom of a crevice 
in the ice, said to be seven hundred feet deep. A guide was let 
down to the bottom by a rope, with a lantern round his neck, and 
after descending twice in vain, the third time was drawn up with 
the body in his arms. He was much broken and bruised, but it 
was impossible to tell whether he was killed instantly by the fall, 
or whether he lay crushed in that awful chasm, breathing his lire 
away in protracted gasps. 

Mounting our horses, we started for the grand Scheideck, near- 
ly eight thousand feet above the level of the sea. As we ap- 
proached that '• peak of tempests" — the Wetterhorn — whose bare 
cliif rose straight up thousands of feet from the path to the regions 
of eternal snow, one of the guides exclaimed — " Voila ! voila .'" 
and another in German, " Sehen sie f selien sie V while I scream- 
ed in English, hook ! look ! And it was time to look ; for from 
the topmost height of the Wetterhorn suddenly arose something 
like white dust, followed by a movement of a mighty mass, and 
the next moment an awful white form leaped away, and, with 
almost a single bound of more than two thousand feet,* came di- 
rectly into our path, a short distance before us. As it struck the 
earth, the crushed snow rose like vapour from the foot of a cata- 
ract, and rolled away in a cloud of mist over a hill of fir trees, 
which it sprinkled white in its passage. The s'lock was like a 

* Thp s:uide said between two and tliree thousand feet. I have tried in vain 
io a.scertain the exact distance from the top to the path. 



THE WITTEiRHORN. 49 

falling roclc, and the echo sounded along the Alpine heights like 
the "roll of far off cannon, and died away over their distant tops. 
One of the guides, belonging to a Scotch gentleman who had that 
morning joined our party, was an old traveller in the Alps, and 
he said that in all his wanderings he had never seen any thing 
equal to it. That serene peak, resting far away up in the clear, 
rare atmosphere — the sudden commotion, and that swift descend- 
ing form of terror, are among the distinct and vivid things of 
memory. 

As we rounded the point where this avalanche struck, we came 
nearly under the most awful precipice that I ever saw or dream- 
ed of. How high that perpendicular wall of Alpine limestone 
may be I dare not hazard a conjecture, but it makes one hold his 
breath in awe and dread to look upon it. The highest church 
spire in America would have been a miniature toy beside it. 
Crawling along like mere insects past the base of this " peak of 
tempests," as its name signifies, we began to ascend the last slope 
of the grand Scheideck. When about halfway up I stopped for 
a long time, hoping I might see another avalanche spring away 
from its high resting place. I was fairly out of harm's way, and 
hence could enjoy the bold leap of a snow precipice from the cliffs 
of the Wetterhorn. I was the more anxious, as avalanches are 
generally, to the eye, mere slender torrents streaming down the 
mountain side. The distance dwindles the roaring, thundering 
mass to a mere rivulet, but this was massive and awful enough 
for the gods them.selves. But I waited in vain. The bright sun 
fell full on the dazzling top, but not a snow-wreath started, and I 
turned away disappointed towards the top of the pass. 

The descent into Meyringen was charming. After having 
passed through the Schwartzwald (dark wild), we came upon a 
perfectly level, smooth and green pasturage. A gentle rivulet 
skirted the side of it, while at one end stood a single Swiss cot- 
tage, t left the path that went into the hills from the farther 
corner and rode to the end and looked back. From my horse's 
feet, up to the very cliffs that frown in savage grandeur over it, 
went that sweet greensward ; while at the left rose a glacier of 
the purest white that fairly dazzled the eyes as the sunbeams fell 
in their noontide splendour upon it. That beautiful, quiet plat 



50 AN ALPINE VALLEY. 

of ground — the dark fir trees environing it — the cliffs that leaned 
above it, and that spiritually white glacier contrasting with the 
bright green below, combined to form a group and a picture that 
seemed more like a vision than a real scene. I gazed in silent 
rapture upon it, drinking in the beauty and strangeness of that 
scene, till I longed to pitch my tent there forever. That level 
greensward seemed to rest like a fearless, innocent child in the 
rough embrace of the great forms around it. It was to me the 
gem of Alpine vallies. 

There is no outward emblem of peace and quietness so striking 
as one of these green spots amid the Alps. The surface of a 
summer lake stirred by no breeze — the quiet night and quieter 
stars are not so full of repose. The ccntrast is not so great. 
Place that quiet lake amid roaring billows, and the repose it 
symbolised would be doubly felt. So amid the Alps. The aw- 
ful scenery that folds in one of these sweet spots of greensward 
makes it seem doubly sweet and green. It imparts a sort of con- 
sciousness to the whole, as if there was a serene trust, a feeling 
of innocence in the brightly smiling meadow. It seems to let it- 
self he embraced by those rude and terrific forms without the least 
fear, and smiles back in their stern and savage faces, as if it knew 
it could not be harmed. And the snow peaks and threatening 
precipices look as if proud of their innocent child, guarding it 
with savage tenderness. What beauty God has scattered over 
the earth ! On the frame- work of the hills, and the valleys they 
enclose — on cliff* and stream, sky and earth, He has drawn the 
lines of beauty and grandeur with a pencil that never errs. But 
especially amid the Alps does he seem to have wrought with sub- 
limest skill. All over its peaks and abysses has he thrown the 
mantle of his Majesty ; while its strong avalanches, falling all 
alone, into solitudes where the foot of man has never trod, and the 
wing of the eagle never stooped, speak " eternally of Him." 
" The ice hills," as they leap away from their high resting place, 



MEYRINGEN. 51 



X. 

YALLEY OF MEYRINGEN -PASS OF BRUNIG. 



As we descended into Meyringen, a Swiss peasant girl came 
running up to me with an Alpine rose in her hand. If it had 
been a spontaneous gift, I could have mused over it for an hour ; 
but given, as it was, for money, destroyed its value, and I placed 
it in my pocket to preserve for an American friend, to whom I 
never designed to mention the circumstance under which it was 
obtained. I stopped a moment to look at the Seilbach (rope fall), 
as it hung in a long white thread from the cliff; and at the roaring 
torrent of the Reichenbach, and then passed into the valley, which 
was resting below in all the quietness of a summer scene. 

One has peculiar feelings in entering an Alpine valley by one 
of these fearful passes. The awful cliffs that have frowned over 
him — the savage gorges up which his eye has strained — the tor- 
rents and avalanches and everlasting snow that have rolled, and 
fallen, and spread around him, have thrown his whole nature into 
a tumult of excitement. And this stupendous scenery has gone 
on changing, from grand to awful, till feelings of horror liave be- 
come mingled with those of sublimity ; so that when his eye first 
rests on one of these sweet valleys smiling in the sunlight, with 
flocks and herds scattered over its bosom, and peasants' cottages 
standing amid the smooth greensward, the transition and contrast 
are so great, that the quietness and repose of Eden seem suddenly 
opened before him. From those wild and torn mountains, that 
have folded in the path so threateningly, the heart emerges into 
one of these valleys, like the torrent along whose course he has 
trod in awe. The foaming cataracts and dark ravines are all 



62 THE OLD SCHOOLMASTER. 

passed, and the placid stream moves, like a smile, ihroufih the 
quiet landscape. 

But this valley, so bright the first day we entered it, became 
dreary enough before we left it. One of those dark, driving Al- 
pine storms set in, and for three days we could not place foot 
out of doors. The chief beauty of the valley consists in the 
two steep parallel ranges of hills enclosing it, now and then 
changing into clifis, along which white cascades hang, as if sus- 
pended there, while far distant snow peaks rise over one another 
in every direction. The Lake of Brienze peeps modestly into 
the farther end of it, enclosed by its ram.parts of mountains. Ta- 
king a carriage to the head of the lake, we there hired a boat to 
Griesbaek falls. A man and his wife rowed us. After clam.ber- 
ing up and down the falls, and under them, and seeing logs which 
one of the party threw in above, leap away from their brink, we 
went in to see the ••' Old Schoolmaster," and hear him and his chil- 
dren and grandchildren sing Alpine songs, vvbiie the white water- 
fall played a sort of bass accompaniment. The singing was very 
fine — the best we heard in Switzerland, and after having pur- 
chased some nick-nacks and music, and paid beforehand for a 
farewell on the Alp-horn, which is said to sound very finely 
from this position, we embarked once more upon the lake. The 
" Old Schoolmaster" told us it was far better to hear the Alp-horn 
when we had got out on the lake. Never supposing he would de- 
ceive us, we laid by on our oars for a long time, but in vain. 
He had fairly Jewed us. 

The clias around this valley send down fearful torrents in the 
spring, one of which — the Alpbach — has once buried a large part 
of the village twenty feet deep with mud and stones. The church 
was filled eighteen feet deep, and the black Ime, indicating the 
high water mark, is still visible on the walls. The last leap of 
the Alpbach is right over a precipice clear into the valley. From 
the peculiar manner in which the sun strikes it, a triple rainbow 
is formed — one of them making a complete circle around your 
feet. To see this last, it is necessary to enter the mist, and take 
a beautiful drenching ; but I was repaid for it, by seeing myself, 
<mce in my life, with a real halo around me, and that too around 
my feet. The beautiful ring held me in its embrace like an en- 



LAKE OF LUNGERN. 53 



chanted circle, until the drenching mist, having finally penetrated 
to my skin, broke the charm. I went shivering hom.e, protesting 
against rainbows being put in such inconvenient places. 

The pass of the Brunig is a mere bridle path, but it presents 
nothing striking to the traveller, except the charming view of thf 
valley of Meyringen, from its summ.it. It is a perfect picture. 

The lake of Lungern, which we passed soon after descending- 
the Brunig, presents a most singular appearance. It has been 
drained twenty feet below its original level, and the steep banks 
that mark its former height, surround it like some old ruined wall. 
The Kaiserstuhl, a high ridge, was stretched across the foot of the 
lake, forming a natural dam, and heaping up the water twenty 
feet higher than the valley below. A tunnel, 1,300 feet Icng, waa 
bored through this, with only a thin partition of rock lef. to hold 
back the flood. Five hundred men were employed on it, reliev- 
ing each other constantly, and for several hours at a time : for 
the impossibility of ventilating the tunnel from above, made the 
air very foul and dangerous. When the work was completed, 
and floodgates constructed below to graduate the rush of the water, 
nine hundred and fifty pounds of powder were placed in the far- 
ther extremity of the tunnel. It was midwinter, and the lake 
frozen over, but multitudes assembled on the morning appointed 
for the explosion to witness the result. The surrounding hills 
were covered with spectators, when a cannon shot from the Kai- 
serstuhl, ansvv'ered by another from the Laudenberg, announced 
that the hour had arrived. A daring Swiss entered the tunnel 
and fired the train. He soon reappeared in safety, while the vast 
multitude stood in breathless anxiety, vvaiting the explosion. The 
leaden minutes wore on, yet no one felt the shock. At length, at 
the end of ten minutes, just as they had concluded it was a fail- 
ure, two distinct thojgh dull reports were heard. The ice lay 
smooth and unbroken as ever, and there was a second disappoint- 
ment, for all supposed the mine had not burst through the parti- 
tion. But, at length, there was a shout from below, and a black 
stream of mud and water was seen to issue from the opening, 
showing that the work was done. This drainage was to recover 
a large tract of land, which was a mere swamp. The object was 



M ALPNACH SLIDE. 



secured, but the lar.d is hardly worth the tilling. The geologist, 
hov/ever, will regard the portion laid bare with interest. 

As we approached Lucerne, we passed the location of the fa- 
mous Alpnach slide, made during the time of Bonaparte, for tho 
purpose of bringing timber for ship-building from the mountains. 
It was eight miles long, and between three and four feet wide, 
and was made of logs fastened together, so as to form a sort of 
trough. This trough went across frightful gorges, and in some 
instances under ground. A rill of water was directed into it to 
lessen the friction, and prevent the logs from taking fire. A 
tree, a hundred feet long and four feet in diameter, would shoot 
tins eight miles in six minutes. When one of these logs bolted 
from the trough, it would fly like an arrow through the air, and 
if it came in contact with a tree would cut it clean in two. The 
whole work is now destroyed. 

Coming, at length, to Lake Lucerne, we took a boat and row. 
ers, and set off for the town that stands so beautifully at its foot. 
1 had been for days in the heart of the Oberland, which contains 
the wildest scenery in the Alps. My meat had been mostly the 
flesh of the Chamois, while the men and the habitations I had 
passed seemed to belong to another world. In one instance, I had 
seen a man carrying boards strapped to his back, between three 
and four miles to his hut, on the high pasturage grounds. There 
was no other way of getting them there. These huts or cottages 
(just as one likes to call them) with their low walls and over- 
hanging roof loaded with stones and rocks, to keep them from be- 
ing blown ofFv/hen the fierce Alpine storm is on his march, have 
an odd look ; though they are sometimes very picturesque, from 
their position. 

From such scenery and dwellings the sight of a town and 
houses was like a sudden waking up from some strange dream. 



SUWARROW'S PASSAGE OF THE PRAGEL. 55 



XL 

SUWAEROW'S PASSAGE OF THE GLARUS. 



At the head of Lake Lucerne stands the little village of Fluel- 
len. It was here that Suwarrow, after forcing the passage of St. 
Gothard, was finally stopped in his victorious course. The lake 
stretched away before him, while there was not a boat with which 
to transport his weary army over. There was no other course 
left him on his route to Zurich but to ascend the heights of the 
Kinzig Culm, a desperate undertaking at the best ; and cross into 
the Muotta Thai. This wonderful retreat was made while his 
army, as it hung along the cliffs, was constantly engaged in resist- 
ing the attacks of the enemy. 

It was forty-six years ago, one night in September, that the peace- 
ful inhabitants of the Muotta Thai were struck with wonder at the 
sudden appearance among them of multitudes of armed men of a 
strange garb and language. They had just gathered their herds 
and flocks to the fold, and were seeking their quiet homes that 
slept amid the green pasturages, when, like a mountain torrent, 
came pouring out from every defile and giddy pass, these strange, 
unintelligible beings. From the heights of the Kinzig Culm — 
from precipices the shepherds scarce dared to tread, they streamed 
with their confused jargon around the cottages of these simple 
children of the Alps. It was Suwarrow, with twenty-four thou- 
sand Russians at his back, on his march from Italy to join the 
allied forces at Zurich. He had forced the passage of St. Go- 
thard, and had reached thus far when he was stopped by Lake 
Lucerne, and was told that Korsakow and the main Russian army 
at Zurich had been defeated. Indignant and incredulous at the 
report, he would have hung the peasant who informed him, as a 



56 BATTLE OF MUOTTA THAL. 

spy, had not the lady-mother of St. Joseph's Nunnery interceded 
in his behalf. Here in this great Alpine valley the bold com. 
mander found himself completely surrounded. Molitor aid his 
battalions looked dov/n on him from the heights around the Muot- 
ta Thai : Mortier and Massena blocked its mouth : whi'.e Le- 
courbe hung on his rear. The Russian bear \\as denned, and 
compelled, for the first time in his life, to order a retreat. He 
wept in indignation and grief, and adopted the only alternative 
left him, to cross the Pragel into Glarus. Then commenced one 
of those desperate marches unparalleled in the history of man. 
Th'i passage of the St. Bernard, by Bonaparte, was a comforta- 
ble march compared to it, and Hannibal's world-renowned exploit 
mere child's play, beside it. While the head of Suwarrow's 
column had descended the Pragel and was fighting desperately at 
Naefels, the rear-guard, encumbered with the wounded, wag 
struggling in the Muotta Thai with Massena and his battalions. 
Then these savage solitudes shook to the thunder of cannon and 
roar of musketry. The startled avalanche came leaping from 
the heights, mingling its sullen thunder with the sound of battle. 
The frightened chamois paused on the high precipice to catch 
the strange uproar that filled the hills. — The simple-hearted peas- 
antry saw their green pasturages covered with battling armies, 
and the snow-capped heights crimson with the blood of men. 
Whole companies fell like snow-wreaths from the rocks M'hile 
the artillery ploughed through the dense mass of human flesh 
that darkened the gorge below. For ten successive days had 
these armies marched and combated, and yet here, on the elev- 
enth, they struggled with unabated resolution. Unable to force 
the passage at Naefels, Suwarrow took the desperate and awful 
resolution of leading his weary and wounded army over the 
mountains into the Grisons. 

Imagine, if you can, an awful solitude of mountains and pre- 
cipices and glaciers piled one above another in savage grandeur. 
Cast your eye up one of these mountains, 7,500 feet above the 
level of the sea, along whose bosom, in a zigzag line, goes a nar- 
row path winding over precipices and snow-fields till finally lost 
on the distant summit. Up that difficult path and into the very 



DIFFICULTIES OF THE PASSAGE. 57 

heart of those fearful snow-peaks has the bold Russian resolved to 
«ead his 24,000 men. 

To increase the difficulties that beset him and render his 
destruction apparently inevitable, the snow fell, on the morning 
he set out, two feet deep, obliterating all traces of the path, and 
forming as it were a winding sheet for his army. In single file, 
and with heavy hearts, that mighty host one after another entered 
the snow-drifts and began the ascent. Only a few miles could 
be made the first day ; and at night, without a cottage in sight, 
without even a tree to kindle for a light around their silent 
bivouacs, the army lay down in the snow with the Alpine crags 
around them for their sentinels. The next day the head of the 
column reached the summit of the ridge, and lo ! what a scene 
was spread out before them. No one who has not stood on an 
Alpine summit can have any conception of the utter dreariness 
of this region. The mighty mountains, as far as the eye can 
reach, lean along the solemn sky, while the deep silence around 
is broken by the sound of no living thing. Only now and then 
the voice of the avalanche is heard speaking in its low thunder 
tone from the depth of an awful abyss, or the scream of a solitary 
eagle circling round some lofty crag. The bold Russian stood 
and gazed long and anxiously on this scene, and then turned to 
look on his straggling army that far as the eye could see wound 
like a huge anaconda over the white surface of the snow. No 
column of smoke arose in this desert wild to cheer the sight, but 
all was silent, mournful and prophetic. The winding sheet of the 
army seemed unrolled before him. No path guided their foot- 
steps, and ever and anon a bayonet and feather disappeared 
together as some poor soldier slipped on the edge of a precipice 
and fell into the abyss below. Hundreds overcome and disheart- 
ened, or exhausted with their previous wounds, laid down to die, 
while the cold wind, as it swept by, soon wrought a snow-shroud 
for their forms. The descent on the southern side was worse 
than the ascent. A freezing wind had hardened the snow into a 
crust, so that it frequently bore the soldiers. Their bayonets 
were thrust into it to keep them from, slipping, and the weary and 
worn creatures were compelled to struggle every step to prevent 
being borne away over the precipices that almost momentarily 



58 THE DESCENT. 



stopped their passage. Yet even this precaution was often vain 
Whole companies would begin to slide together, and despite every 
effort would sweep with a shriek over the edge of the precipice 
and disappear in the untrodden gulfs below. Men saw their 
comrades, by whose side they had fought in many a battle, shoot 
one after another, over the dizzy verge, striking with their bayo- 
nets as they went, to* stay their progress. The beasts of burden 
slipped from above, and rolling down on the ranks below, shot 
away in wild confusion, men and all, into the chasms that yawned 
at their feet. As they advanced, the enemy appeared around on 
the precipices pouring a scattered yet destructive fire into the 
straggling multitude. Such a sight these Alpine solitudes never 
saw — such a march no army ever made before. In looking at 
this pass the traveller cannot believe an army of 24,000 men 
were marched over it through the fresh fallen snov/ two feet deep. 
For five days they struggled amid these gorges and over these 
ridges, and finally reached the Rhine at Ilanz. For months 
after, the vulture and the eagle hovered incessantly along the line 
of march, and beasts of prey were gorged with the dead bodies. 
Nearly 8,000 men lay scattered among the glaciers and rocks, 
and piled in the abysses, amid which they had struggled for 
eighteen days since they first poured down from the St. Gothard, 
and the peasants say that the bones of many an unburied soldier 
may still be seen bleaching in the ravines of the Jatser. 

No Christian or philanthropist ever stood on a battle field with- 
out mourning over the ravages of war and asking himself when 
that day would come when men would beat their swords into 
ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Yet the evil 
is not felt in all its dreadful reality there. The movements of the 
armies — the tossing of plumes — the unrolling of banners — the 
stirring strains of martial music — the charging squadrons, and 
the might and magnificence of a great battle field disturb the 
imagiiiation and check the flow of human sympathy. 

If he wishes the feelings of horror and disgust in their full 
strength, let him go into the solitude and holiness of nature, and 
see where her pure bosom has been disfigured with the blood of 
her children. Let him see his fellow beings falling by thousands, 
not 9 mid the uproar and excitement ol battle, but under exhaus- 



SUWARROW AND BONAPARTE. 59 

tioo, heart-sickness, and despair. Let him behold the ranks 
lying down one after another -under the last discouragement to 
die, while their comrades march mournful and silent by. There 
is a cold-bloodedness, a sort of savage malice about this that 
awakens all the detestation of the human bosom. 

Yet the Russian could do no better. The scourge of nations 
had driven him into the strait. The crime and the judgment 
belong to Bonaparte, who thus directly and indirectly crowded 
his generation into the grave. Suwarrow's act was that of a 
brave and resolute man.* 

* Th(3 reader of " Napoleon and his Marshals" need not be told that I haTO 
tshangei my opinion on this point. 



MACDOXALD'S GUIDE. 



XII. 

MACDONALD'S PASS OF THE SPLUGEN. 



I WAS standing on a green Alpine pasturage, looking off upon 
xhe Splugen Pass which cut its way through the white snow ridge 
that lay against the distant horizon, when my guide interrupted 
my musings by pointing to an aged man sitting by his cottage 
door. "That man," said he, "was one of Macdonald's guides 
that conducted him and his army over the Splugen." He imme- 
diately became an object of great interest to me, and I went and 
sat down by his side, and drew from him many incidents of that 
perilous adventure. " It was forty-three years ago," said he, 
" when that av»'ful march was made. I was then but twenty-five 
years of age, but I remember it as if it were but yesterday. I 
have made many passes in the Alps, but never one like that. 
That Macdonald was an awful man. He looked as if he wanted 
to fight the very Alps, and believed that snow-storms could be 
beaten like an army of men." 

" I believe," I replied, " that pass was made in the winter, when 
even foot travellers found it difficult." " Yes ; and the wind blew, 
and the snow drove in our faces, and the avalanches fell as if the 
very Alps were coming down. The snow, too, was so thick at 
times, that we could not see the horses or men ten rods before or 
behind, while the screaming, and yelling, and cursing, made it ten 
times wor.se. Why, sir, it did no good to cry take care, for no 
one could take care. There we were, up to our arms in snow, 
amid oxen, and horses, and cannon, and soldiers, and compell- 
ed to stand for hours, without getting one rod ahead. Oh, it 
was dreadful to see the poor soldiers. Often I would hear 
an avalar.che coming from above, and turn to see where it fell, 



DESCRIPTION OF THE PASS. 61 

when it would come thundering straight on to the army, and cut 
it clean in two, leaving a great gap in the lines. A few feathers 
tossing amid the snow, a musket or two flying over the brink, and 
away went men and all into the gulf below. Oh, sir, those poor 
soldiers looked as if they never would fight again — so downcast 
and frightened. It did no good to have courage there, for what 
could courage do against an avalarche! When God fights with 
man, it does no good to resist." In this manner, though not in the 
precise words, the old man rattled on, and it was evident I could 
get nothing from him except separate incidents which gave life and 
vividness to the whole picture. The falling of a single comrade 
by his side, or the struggles of a single war-horse, as he floun- 
dered in the mass of snow that hurried him irresistibly towards 
the gulf, made a more distinct impression on him than the general 
movements of the army. The deep beds of snow and the walls 
of ice he and the peasants were compelled to cut through, were 
more important to him than the order of march, or the discipline 
of the troops. How different is the effect produced on a powerful 
and a common mind by such a scene as this ! One dwells on the 
impression made by the whole. The moral and physical gran- 
deur surrounding it — the obstacles, and the resolution that over- 
came them — the savageness of nature, and the sternness that 
dared look it in the face ; combine to make the impression he car- 
ries with him through life. The weak mind, on the other hand, 
never seems to reach to these generalities — never gets to the outer 
circle, but is occupied with details and incidents. 

To understand this march of Macdonald over the Splugen, a 
feat greater by far than Bonaparte's famous passage of the St. 
Bernard, imagine an awful defile leading up to the height of six 
thousand, Jive hundred feet towards heaven — in summer a mere 
bridle path, and in winter a mass of avalanches, and you will 
have some conception of the fearful pass through which Macdonald 
determined to lead fifteen thousand men. The road follows the 
Rhine, here a mere rivulet, which has cut it? channel deep in the 
mountains that rise frequently to the height of three thousand feet 
above it. Along the precipices that overhang this turbulent tor- 
rent, the path is cut in the solid rock, now hugging the mountain 
wall like a mere thread, and now shooting in a single arch over 

15 



C2 DIFFICULTIES OF THE PASS. 

the gorge that sinks three hundred feet below. Strangely silent 
snow-peaks pierce the heavens in every direction, while dark 
precipices lean out on every side over the abyss. This mere 
path crosses and re- crosses again this gorge, and often so high 
above it, that the roar of the mad torrent below can scarcely be 
heard ; and finally strikes off on to the bare face of the mountain 
and clambers up to the summit. This is the old road in sum- 
mer time. Now imagine this same gorge swept by a hurricane 
of snow, and filled with the awful sound of falling avalanches, 
blending their heavy shock with the dull roar of the giant pines, 
that wave along the precipices, while half way up from the bot- 
tom to the Alpine top, are hanging like an army of insects, fifteen 
thousand French soldiers ; and you w ill approach to some know- 
ledge of this wintry pass, and this desperate march. But if you 
have never been in an Alpine gorge, and stood, awe-struck, amid 
the mighty forms that tower away on every side around you, you 
can have no true conception of a scene like the one we are to de- 
scribe. Rocks, going like one solid wall straight up to heaven — 
pinnacles shooting like church spires above the clouds — gloomy 
ravines where the thunder-clouds burst, and the torrent raves — ■ 
still glaciers and solemn snow-fields, and leaping avalanches, 
combine to render an Alpine gorge one of the most terrific things 
in nature. Added to all this, you feel so small amid the mighty 
forms around you — so utterly helpless and worthless, amid these 
great exhibitions of God's power, that the heart is often utterly 
overwhelmed with the feelings that struggle in vain for utterance. 
There is now a carriage road over the Splugen, cut in sixteen 
zigzags along the breast of the mountain. This was not in 
existence when Macdonald made the pass, and there was nothing 
but a bridle path going through the gorge of the Cardinel. Over 
such a pass was Macdonald ordered by Napoleon to march his 
army in the latter part of November, just when the wintry storms 
are setting in with the greatest violence. Bonaparte wished 
i\Iacdonald to form the left wing of his army in Italy, and had 
therefore ordered him to attempt the passage. Macdonald, though 
no braver or bolder man ever lived, felt that it was a hopeless 
undertaking, and immediately despatched General Dumas to 
represent to liim the insuperable obstacles in the way. Bona- 



COMMENCEMENT OF THE ASCENT, 63 

parte heard him through his representations, and then replied, 
with his usual recklessness of other people's sufferings or death, 
*' I will make no change in my dispositions. Return quickly, 
and tell Macdonald that an army can always pass in every sea- 
son, where two men can place their feet." 

Macdonald, of course, could do no otherwise than obey com- 
mands, and immediately commenced the necessary preparations 
for his desperate undertaking. It was the 26th of November, a«d 
the frequent storms had covered the entire Alps, pass and all, in 
one mass of yielding snow. His army was at the upper Rhein- 
thal or Rhine valley, at the entrance of the dreadful defile of the 
Via Mala, the commencement of the Splugen pass. The cannon 
were taken from their carriages and placed on sleds, to which 
oxen were harnessed. The ammunition was divided about on the 
backs of mules, while every soldier had to carry, besides his 
usual arms, five packets of cartridges and five days' provision. 
The guides went in advance, and stuck down long black poles to 
indicate the course of the path beneath, while behind them came 
the workmen clearing away the snow, and behind them still, the 
mounted dragoons, with the most powerful horses of the army, to 
beat down the track. On the 26th of November, the first com- 
pany left Splugen, and began the ascent. The pass from Splu- 
gen to Isola is about fifteen miles in length, and the advance com- 
pany had, after the most wasting toil and exhausting effort, made 
nearly half of it, and were approaching the hospice on the sum- 
mit, when a low moaning was heard among the hills, like the 
voice of the sea before a storm. The guides understood too well 
its meaning, and gazed on each other with alarm. The ominous 
sound grew louder every moment, and suddenly the fierce Alpine 
blast swept in a cloud of snow over the mountain, and hovrled, 
like an unchained demon, through the gorge below. In an in- 
stant all was confusion, and blindness, and uncertainty. The very 
heavens were blotted out, and the frightened column stood and lis- 
tened to the raving tempest that made the pine trees above it sway 
and groan, as if lifted from their rock-rooted places. But suddenly 
another still more alarming sound was heard — " An avalanche ! an 
avalanciie !" shrieked the guides, and the next moment an awful 
white form came leaping down the mountain, and striking the 



G4 THE AR:^IY IN A ST0R:\I 

column that was struggling along the path, passed straight through 
it into the gulf below, carrying thirty dragoons and their horses 
with it in its wild plunge. The black form of a steed and its 
rider were seen suspended for a moment in mid heavens, amid 
clouds of snow, and the next moment they fell among the ice and 
rocks below, crushed out of the very forms of humanity. The 
head of the column reached the hospice in safety. The other 
part, struck dumb by this sudden apparition crossing their path 
in such lightning-like velocity, bearing to such an awful death 
their brave comrades, refused to proceed, and turned back to the 
village of Splugen. For three days the storm raged amid the 
Alps, filling the heavens with snow, and hurling avalanches into 
the path, till it became so filled up that the guides declared it 
would take fifteen days to open it again so as to make it at all 
passable. But fifteen days Macdonald could not spare. Inde- 
pendent of the urgency of his commands, there was no way to 
provision his army in these Alpine solitudes, and he must proceed. 
He ordered four of the strongest oxen that could be found to be 
led in advance by the best guides. Forty peasants followed be- 
hind, clearing away and beating down the snow, and tv^'o com- 
panies of sappers came after to give still greater consistency to 
the track, while on their heels marched the remnant of the com- 
pany of dragoons, part of which had been borne away three 
days before by the avalanche. The post of danger was given 
them at their ov/n request. Scarcely had they begun the danger- 
ous enterprise, when one of the noble oxen slipped from the preci- 
pice, and with a convulsive fling of his huge frame, went bound- 
ing from point to point of the jagged rocks to the deep, dark tor- 
rent below. 

It was a strange sight for a wintry day. Those three oxen, 
with their horns just peering above the snow, toiled slowly on, 
pushing their unwieldy bodies through the drifts, looking like mere 
specks on the breast of the mountain, while the soldiers, up to 
their breasts, struggled behind. Not a drum or bugle-note cheered 
the solitude, or awoke the echoes of those savage peaks. The 
foot-fall gave back no sound in the soft snow, and the words of 
command seemed smothered in the very atmosphere. Silently 
and noiselessly the mighty but disordered column toiled forward, 



PARTICULARS OF THE ROUTE. 65 

with naught to break the holy stiUness of nature, save the fierce 
pantings of the horses and animals, as with reeking sides they 
strained up the ascent. Now and then a fearful cry startled the 
eagle on his high circuit, as a whole company slipped together, 
and with their muskets in their hands, fell into the all-devouring 
gorge that yawned hundreds of feet below their path. It was a 
wild sight, the plunge of a steed and his rider over the precipice. 
One noble horse slipped just as the dragoon had dismounted, and 
as he darted off with 'his empty saddle, and for a moment hung 
suspended in mid heaven, it is said, he uttered one of those fear- 
ful blood-freezing cries the wounded war-horse is known some- 
times to give forth on the field of battle. The roar of the lion af- 
ter his prey, and the midnight howl of the wolf that has missed 
his evening repast of blood, is a gentle sound compared to it. 
Once heard, it lives in the memory and brain for ever. 

To understand the route of the army better, one should divide 
the pass into three parts. First comes the dark, deep defile, with 
the path cut in the side of the mountain, and crossing backwards 
and forwards over the gorge, on bridges of a single arch, and of- 
ten two and three hundred feet high. The scenery in this gorge 
is horrible. It seems as if nature had broken up the mountains 
in some sudden and fierce convulsion ; and the very aspect of 
everything is enough to daunt one without the aid of avalanches 
or hurricanes of snow. After leaving this defile, the path goes 
for a few miles through the valley of Schams, and then winds up 
the cliffs of La Raffla, covered with pine trees. It then strikes 
up the bare face of the mountain, going sometimes at an angle of 
forty-five degrees, till it reaches the summit ; which, lying above 
the region of trees, stands naked and bald in the wintry heavens. 
This is the old road — the new one goes by a different route, and 
in summer-time can be traversed with carriages. Such was the 
road, filled with snow and avalanches, this army of fifteen thou- 
sand men marched over in mid winter. They went over in sep- 
arate columns. The progress and success of the first we have 
already shown. The second and third made the attempt the sec- 
ond and third of December, and achieved the ascent in safety, 
the weather being clear and frosty. Many, however, died of 
cold. Their success encouraged Macdonald to march the whole 

6 



PROGRESS OF THE ARMY. 



remairiing army over at once, and for this purpose he placed hun- 
self at their head, and on the 5th of December commenced the 
ascent. But fresh snow had fallen the night before, covering up 
the entire path, so that the road had all to be made over again. 
The guides refused to go on, but Macdonald would not delay his 
march, and led his weary soldiers breast deep in the snow, up the 
bleak, cold mountain. They were six hours in going less than 
six miles. They could not make a mile an hour in their slow 
progress. They had not advanced far in the defile before they 
came upon a huge block of ice, and a newly-fallen avalanche, 
that entirely filled up the path. The guides halted before these 
obstacles and refused to go on ; and the first that Macdonald 
knew, his army had turned to the right-about, and were marching 
back down the mountain, declaring the passage to be closed. 

Hastening forward, he cheered up the men, and walking him- 
self at the head of the column with a long pole in his hand, to 
sound the depth of the treacherous mass he was treading upon, he 
revived the drooping spirits of the soldiers. "Soldiers," said he, 
" your destinies call you into Italy ; advance and conquer — first 
the mountains and the snow, then the plains and the armies."' 
Ashamed to see their leader hazarding his life at every step 
where they refused to go, the soldiers returned cheerfully to their 
toil, and cut their way through the solid hill of ice. But they 
had scarcely surmounted this obstacle, when the voice of the hur- 
ricane on its march was again heard, and the next moment a 
cloud of driving snow obliterated every thing from their view. 
The path was filled up, and all traces of it swept utterly away. 
Amid the screams of the guides, the confused commands of the 
officers, and the howling of the hurricane, was heard the rapid 
thunder-crash of avalanches as they leaped away, at the bidding 
of the tempest, down the precipices. Then commenced again the 
awful struggle of the army for life. The foe they had to contend 
with was an outward one, though not of flesh and blood. To 
Bword-cut, bayonet-thrust, and the blaze of artillery, the strong 
Alpine storm was alike invulnerable. On the serried column 
and the straggling line, it thundered with the same reckless pow- 
er. Over the long black line of soldiers, the snow lay like u 
winding-sheet, and the dirge seemed already ciianted for the dead 



PASSAGE OF THE LAST DIVISION. 67 

army. No one who has not seen an Alpine storm can imagine 
the reckless energy with which it rages through the mountains. 
The light snow, borne aloft on its bosom, was whirled and scat- 
tered like an ocean of mist over all things. The drifts were piled 
like second mountains in every direction, and seemed to form in- 
stantaneously, as by the touch of a magician's wand. The blind- 
ing fury of the tempest baffled all efforts to pierce the mystery 
and darkness that enveloped the host clinging in despair to the 
breast of the mountain. The storm had sounded its trumpet for 
the charge, but no answering note of defiance replied. The 
heroes of so many battle fields stood in still terror before this new 
and mightier foe. Crowding together as if proximity added to 
their security, the broken ranks crouched and shivered to the 
blast that pierced their very bones with its chilling power. But 
this was not all — the piercing cold, and drifting snow, and raving 
tempest, and concealed pit-falls, leading to untrodden abysses, 
were not enough to complete the scene of terror. Suddenly, from 
the summit of the Splugen, avalanches began to fall, whose path 
crossed that of the army. Scaling the breast of the mountain 
with a single leap, they came with a crash on the shivering 
column, and bore it away to the destruction that waited beneath. 
Still, with undaunted front and unyielding will, the bold Macdon- 
ald struggled on in front, inspiring by his example, as he never 
could have done by his commands, the ofiicers and men under 
him. Prodigies were wrought where effort seemed useless. The 
first avalanche, as it smote through the column, paralyzed for a 
moment every heart with fear ; but they soon began to be viewed 
like so many discharges of artillery, and the gaps they made, 
like the gaps a discharge of grape-shot frequently makes in the 
lines on a field of battle. Those behind closed up the rent with 
unfaltering courage. Hesitation was death. The only hope was 
in advancing, and the long and straggling line floundered on in the 
snow, like a huge anaconda winding itself over the mountain. 
Once, as an avalanche cut through the ranks, bearing them away 
to the abyss, a young man was seen to wave an adieu to his 
young comrade left behind, as he disappeared over the crag. 
The surviving companion stept into the path where it had 
swept, and before he had crossed it, a laggard block of ice came 



68 GREATNESS OP THE FEAT. 

thundering down, and bore him away to join his comrade in the 
gulf where his crushed form still lay tlirobbing. The extrei.ie 
density of the atmosphere, filled as it was with snow, gave ten- 
fold horror to these mysterious messengers of death, as they came 
down the mountain declivities. A low rumbling would be heard 
amid the pauses of the storm, and as the next shriek of the blast 
swept by, a rushing, as if a counter-blast smote the ear; and 
before the thought had time to change, a rolling, leaping, broken 
mass of snow burst through the thick atmosphere, and the next 
moment, crushed, with the sound of thunder, far, far below, bear- 
ing along a part of the column to its deep, dark resting-place. 

On the evening of the 6th December, the greater part of the 
army had passed the mountain, and the van had pushed even to 
Lake Como. From the 26th of November to the 6th of Decem- 
ber, or nearly two weeks, had Macdonald been engaged in this 
perilous pass. A less energetic, indomitable man would have 
failed ; and he himself escaped utter destruction, almost by a 
miracle. As it was, he left between one and two hundred men 
in the abysses of the Splugen, who had slipped from the preci- 
pices or been carried away by avalanches, during the toilsome 
march. More than a hundred horses and mules had also been 
hurled into those untrodden abysses, to furnish food for the eagle, 
and raven, and beasts of prey. 

This passage of the Splugen, by an army of fifteen thousand 
men, in the dead of winter, and amid hurricanes of snow and 
falling avalanches, stands unrivalled in the liistory of the world, 
unless the passage of the Pragel by Suwarrow be its counterpart. 
It is true. Bonaparte spoke disparagingly of it, because he wished 
his passage over the St. Bernard in summer time, to stand alone 
beside Hannibal's famous march over the same mountain. With 
all his greatness, Bonaparte had some miserably mean traits of 
character. He could not bear to have one of his generals per- 
form a greater feat than himself, and so he deliberately lied about 
this achievement of Macdonald, In his despatches to the French 
government, he made it out a small affair, while he had the impu- 
dence to declare that this " march of Macdonald produced no 
good efiect." Now one of three things is true : Bonaparte either 
was ignorant of his true situation, and commanded the passage 



BONAPARTE'S DISHONESTY. 



of the Splugen to be made under a false alarm ; or else it was a 
mere whim, in which his recklessness of the lives and comfort 
of his countrymen is deserving of greater condemnation than his 
ignorance ; or else he has uttered a falsehood as gross as it is 
mean. The truth is, Bonaparte thought posterity could be cheat- 
ed as easily as his cotemporaries. In the dazzling noon-day of 
his fame, he could make a flattering press say what he liked, and 
the world would believe it ; but the tumult and false splendour of 
his life have passed away, and men begin to scrutinize this demi- 
god a little more closely ; and we find that his word cannot be 
relied on in the least, when speaking of the character and deeds 
of others. He is willing to have no planet cross his orbit, and 
will allow no glory except as it is reflected from him. But not- 
withstanding his efforts to detract from the merit of this act of 
Macdonald, posterity will put it in its true light, and every intelli- 
gent reader of the accounts of the two passages of the St. Ber- 
nard and the Splugen, will perceive at a glance that Bonaparte's 
achievement is mere child's play beside that of Macdonald. 



7« MOUNT RIGHI. 



XIII. 

THE EIGHI CULM 



From the top of the Righi is seen one of the most celebrated 
views in all Switzerland. The magnificent prospect it commands 
is not owing so much to its height (it being only 5700 feet above 
the level of the sea) as to its isolated position. It rises like a 
cone up from Lakes Lucerne and Zug, with a forest round its 
waist, and a lofty precipice for its forehead sloping away into 
green pasturages. 

I went by way of Kussnacht, in order to visit the spot where 
William Tell leaped ashore from the boat that was conveying 
him a prisoner to that place, and sent an arrow through the heart 
of Gessler. By this route it takes seven hours to reach the Culm 
of the Righi from Lucerne. I had started with many misgivings, 
and with depressed feelings. The companions of my travels had 
had enough of mountain climbing and of Switzerland, and here 
resolved to start for England. It requires no common resolution 
to break away from all one's companions in a strange land, and 
turn one's footsteps alone towards the Alps. But the Righi I was 
determined to see, and the surpassing prospect from its summit, 
even though I waited a week to enjoy it. 

But all this was forgotten for a while as I entered the Hohle- 
gasse or narrow way where Tell lay concealed, waiting the ty- 
rant's approach. I could imagine the very look of this bold free 
Swiss, as concealed among the trees he drew the silent arrow to 
its head, and sent it on its mission of death. The shout of a fi'ee 
people was in the twang of that bow, and the hand of Liberty 
herself sent the bolt home ; while in that manly form that went 
leaping like a chamois over the hills, was the hope of Switzer- 



WILLIAM TELL. 71 



land. From this hallowed spot I began the toilsome ascent of the 
Righi with no companion but my guide. It was a bright summer 
afternoon, and stripping off my coat and handing it with my cloak 
to my guide, I nerved myself for my four hours of constant 
climbing. When about half way up, 1 sat down and looked back 
on the scene. There was Lucerne, from which my companions 
were just about starting for England and for home. Away from 
it into the very bosom of the mountains went the sweet Lake of 
Lucerne. Close at my feet, apparently, nestled the little chapel 
of Tell, built on the spot where the patriot slew the tyrant; while 
far away swept the land of the Swiss. As an American, I could 
not view the land of Tell and Winkelried, and look down on the 
shores where the " oath of the Grutli" was taken, and Switzer- 
land made her first stand for freedom, without the deepest emo- 
tion. There slept the sweet Lake of Lucerne calm and tranquil 
as the heavens above it. But there was a night when its waters 
were lashed into fury by an Alpine storm, and close beside those 
old rocks struggled a frail vessel hopelessly with the tempest. 
The lightning, as it rent the gloom, showed ever and anon its 
half-buried form amid the waves. The torn sail was shivering 
in the blast, while the roar of the billows on the rocks fell dis- 
tinctly on the ears of the appalled listeners, as they looked to 
each other for help in vain. A tyrant stood trembling on its 
foam-covered deck, and asked if there was no help. A stern 
proud prisoner was brought before him, and looked, calmly out 
upon the frightful deep. " Unbind him," said the tyrant — " he 
alone can save us." The chains were knocked off; and with the 
same calm, silent mien, he seized the helm and guided the leap- 
ing vessel safely amid the rocks. The boat is ashore, but where 
is the prisoner ? Fled ? aye, fled ! but not for safety alone. 
The night covers him, and the tyrant has entered the narrow 
gorge on his way to his home. A sharp twang as of a bow- 
string, — a quick, hissing sound through the air, and Gessler falls 
back in the arms of his attendants, with an arrow in lis bosom. 
" Das war TelVs Sclioss .^" exclaimed the tyrant and died. Then 
rang the battle cry of Freedom along these shores, and from her 
hundred mountain vallies came pouring down the hardy Swiss. 
With the sword of Tell to wave them, on, they bravely battled 



72 ASCENT OF THE MOUNTAIN. 

their way to freedom. Blessings on thee, bold Swiss ! thy name 
is a watchword for freemen and ever shall be. Around it cluster 
the fondest memories of the patriot, and children love to speak it 
aloud. But ah, how degenerate has the race become ! Cor- 
rupted and debased by the French, their freedom and their hon- 
esty have departed together. 

I turned to ascend the mountain again. Crossing a narrow 
level pasturage, I was greeted with the tinkling of bells, and the 
clear voices of shepherd boys singing in a shrill falsetto their wild 
Alpine chorusses. As I drew near the top, I passed a boy lean- 
ing against a rock, and making the air ring with the tones of his 
Alpine horn. A few moments after a cloud of mist swept over 
the mountain, burying every thing in twilight gloom and chilling 
my blood like the sudden entrance to a damp vault. The sun, 
which a moment before shone over me in unclouded brightness, 
was snatched from my sight, and I stumbled on in a cloud to the 
house on the top. The wind swept by in gusts, making the mist 
dive and plunge and leap through the air like mad spirits. Now 
it would rise towards me as I looked over the precipice, like the 
snioke from some vast furnace, and then plunge again into the 
gulfs below, while the fragments writhed and twisted together as 
if tortured into agony by some invisible agency. I had scarcely 
entered the house before a cold chill seized me that seemed im- 
possible to shake off, and which the good woman of the house had 
the kindnegs to tell me, unless I did, would end in a fever in the 
morning, I sJiouId have brought some dry clothing with me, but 
forgot it. Fire and water, brandy and wine, were tried in suc- 
ces.sion, but still I kept shaking. As a last resort I cleared the 
largest room in the house, and then wrapping my heavy cloak 
around me, began to leap and run and throw myself into the most 
difficult postures, to the no small wonderment of the quiet Swiss. 
But in half an hour I had the satisfaction of feeling the blood flow 
warmer and hotter through my veins, while the perspiration stood 
in drops on my forehead. I had conquered, and after resting a 
while, went out to the verge of the cliff which shoots its naked 
wall two hundred feet clear down to Lake Zug, and endeavoured 
to pierce the cloud that had changed day into night. I knew it 
was not yet sundown, and hoped I might see its last rays falling 



VIEW AT EVENING 73 

over the magnificent panorama which I knew was spread out be- 
low me. It was all in vain : that cloud closed round the summi* 
like a gloomy fate, and shut all out of sight. But suddenly, as I 
was gazing, a lake of fire, miles away, burst on the view ; one 
half red as flame, and the other half midnight blackness, streaked 
with a murky red. The next moment it shut again, and in an- 
other direction another fiery surface flashed up into the awful 
blackness, reminding me more than anything I ever sav/, of what a 
distant view of perdition might be. This strange spectacle was 
caused by the cloud opening before me and revealing a portion 
of a distant lake, while the mist was still dense enough to refract 
the rays of the sun, givijig that dark smoky red you sometimes 
see on the edge of a thunder-cloud, as it rolls up at sunset after a 
scorching day. I sat up till late at night reading Schiller's Wil- 
liam Tell, and then retired giving directions to be waked up early 
in the morning to see the sun rise. I had many misgivings, I 
confess, about the morning, and the verse composed once by an 
Englishman who made the ascent, and which were the last words 
uttered by my companions as I bade them good bye, were con- 
stantly running in my head. 

Seven weary up-hill leagues we sped 

The setting sun to see : 
Sullen and grim he went to bed ; 

Sullen and grim went we. 
Nine sleepless hours of night we passed 

The rising sun to see : 
Sullen and grim he rose again ; 

Sullen and grim rose we. 

I passed the hours sleepless enough, and when I rose to look 
out in the morning, an impenetrable mist seemed to wrap every 
thing. I was just crawling back to bed again when I thought I 
would take another look. Passing my hand over the glass, I 
found what I had taken for mist was simply the vapour condensed 
on the window. A clear blue sky was bending overhead. 

In a few moments I was standing on the brow of the precipice 
and watching with intense interest the scene around me. On my 
right, stood cold and silent, white and grand, the whole range of 
the Bernese Alps, Close under me, hundreds of feet down, lay 



74 VIEW AT SUNRISE. 



the waters of the Zug, and yet so close to the mountain on which 
I stood, that it seemed as if I could kick a stone into it. On the 
left spread away the glorious Swiss land, sprinkled over with vil- 
lages and lakes. Behind me was the Lucerne throwing its arms 
away into the heart of the mountains, while forests, rivers, towns, 
hills and lakes, formed together a panorama three hundred miles 
in circumference. While I stood gazing, awe-struck, on the 
silent majestic scene as it lay motionless in the gray light of 
■morning, a golden streak spread along the East. Brighter and 
brighter it grew till the snow-peak nearest it caught the same 
fiery glow, and stood tipped with flame over the world of snow 
below. Suddenly another peak flashed up beside it, and then 
another and another, till fof nearly a hundred miles, from the 
Sentis to the Jungfrau, the whole range of giant summits, stood, 
a deep rose colour against a blue sky, while vast snow-fields 
and glaciers slept in deep shadow between. I stood bewildered 
and amazed, gazing on that hundred miles of rose-coloured 
mountains. It seemed for the time as if the Deity had thrown 
the robe of his glory over those gigantic forms on purpose to see 
how they became their gorgeous apparelling. Gradually they 
paled away as the blazing fiery ball rolled into view and poured 
a flood of light on the whole scene, waking the landscape into 
sudden life and beauty. It is impossible to describe such a 
scene. The whole range of the Bernese Alps before you, with 
its peaks, and glaciers, and precipices, and snow-fields, and 
gorges, is a scene in itself which has no parallel in the world, 
while the sudden change from ghostly white to a transparent red, 
fading gradually away into a delicate rose-colour, renders the 
spectator unable to seize any one thing which would give spe- 
ciality to the whole. I have never felt the utter powerlessness 
of words and feebleness of all comparisons, as in attempting to 
describe such a scene as spreads away on the vision from Mount 
Righi at sunrise. 

But cast your eye round the horizon now the full light of day 
is on it. To the west the country opens like a map, with the 
whole canton of Lucerne in view, while far away, a mere pool, 
glitters the Lake of Sempach, whose shores are one of Switzer- 
land's glorious battle fields. The eye passes on over Lucerne 



AFTER SUNRISE. 



and the gloomy Pilatus, and finally leaves the western horizon on 
the Jura mountains. On the south spring up into heaven the 
whole glorious chain of the high Alps of Berne, Unterwalden and 
Uri in one unbroken ridge of peaks and glaciers. On the east 
still stretches away the Alpine chain, folding in the cantons of 
Glarus and Appenzel, and the Muotta Thai, that v/ild valley 
where Suwarrow and Massena fought their bloody battles on ground 
that even the chamois hunter scarce dared to tread. Nearer 
by rises the mass of the Rossberg, with the black chasm made 
by its terrible avalanche of earth, as it rolled down on Goldau, 
plainly in view. To the north peeps out Lake Zurich, with here 
and there a white roof of the town ; and the spire of the chapel 
where Zwingli fell in battle. The towns of Arth and Zug are 
also visible, and a bare hand's breadth of Lake Egeri, on whose 
shores the Swiss fought and gained the battle of Mortgarten. 
The Black Forest hills shut in the view. It is a glorious pano- 
rama, changing from grand to beautiful and back again, till the 
heart staggers under the emotions that crowd it, asking in vain 
for utterance. But the eye will turn again and again to that 
wondrous chain of white peaks, resting so clear and pure and 
cold against the morning sky, and the lips will murmur — 



The hills, the everlasting hills, 
How peerlessly they rise, 

Like earth's gigantic sentinels 
Discoursing in the skies.'* 



t6 MOUNT ROSSBERG 



XIY. 

GOLDAU-FALL OF THE ROSSBERG. 



As I descended the Righi towards Goldau I had a clear and 
distinct view of the whole side of the Rossberg. This mountain, 
so renowned in history, is about 5,000 feet high, with an unbroken 
slope reaching down to Goldau. The top of the mountain is com- 
posed of pudding stone, called by the Germans Nagelflue, or nail 
head, from the knobs on the surface. The whole strata of this 
mountain are tilted from Lake Zug towards Goldau, and slope, 
like the roof of a house, down to the village. The frightful land 
slide, which buried the village and inhabitants of Goldau, was 
about three miles long, a thousand feet broad, and a hundred feet 
thick. The fissure runs up and down the mountain, and the mass 
slid away from its bed, till acquiring momentum and velocity, it 
broke into fragments, and rolled and thundered down the moun- 
tain, burying the village a hundred feet deep. The afternoon of 
the catastrophe, the Rossberg gave ominous signs of some ap- 
proaching convulsion. Rocks started spontaneously from its bo- 
som, and thundered down its sides; the springs of water suddenly 
ceased to flow; birds flew screaming through the air; the pine 
trees of the forest rocked and swayed without any blast, and the 
whole surface of the mountain seemed gradually sliding towards 
the plain. A party of eleven travellers from Berne was on its 
way to the Righi at the time. Seven of them happened to be 
ahead, and the other four saw them enter the village of Goldau 
just as they observed a strange commotion on the summit of the 
Rossberg* As they raised their glass to notice this more definitely, 
a shower of stones shot off from the top and whirled like cannon 
balls through the air above their heads. The next moment a 



OVERTHROW OF GOLDAU. "7 

cloud of dust filled the valley, while from its bosom came a wild 
uproar, as if nature was breaking up from her deep foundations. 
The Rossberg was on the march for Goldau with the strength and 
terror of an earthquake. The cloud cleared away and nothing 
but a wild waste of rocks and earth was above where the smiling 
villages of Goldau, Bussingen and Rothen stood before. One 
hundred and eleven houses, and more than two hundred stables 
and chalets had disappeared ; carrying down with them in their 
dark burial nearly five hundred human beings. The Lake of 
Lowertz was half filled with mud, while the immense rocks trav- 
ersed the valley its entire width, and Were hurled far up the 
Righi, mowing down the trees like cannon shot. The inhabitants 
of the neighbouring villages heard the grinding crushing sound, as 
of mountains falling together, and beheld the cloud of dust that 
darkened the air. Five minutes after, and all was hushed, and 
the quiet rain came down as before, and as it had done during the 
day, but no longer on human dwellings. It fell on the grave of 
nearly 500 men, women and children, crushed and mangled, and 
pressed uncofnned into their mother earth. Nothing was left of 
the villages and pasturages that stood in the valley but the bell 
of the church of Goldau, which was carried a mile and a half 
from the steeple in which it hung. When the Lake of Lowertz, 
five miles off, received the torrent of earth into its bosom, it threw 
a wave seventy feet high clear over the island of Schwanau, and 
rolled up on the opposite shore, bringing back, in its reflux, houses 
with their inhabitants. The friends whom their fellow travellers 
had seen enter the village of Goldau just as the mountain started 
on its march, were never seen more. 

It was a beautiful day, as I sat and looked over this chaos of 
rocks and earth. The Lake of Lowertz slept quietly under the 
summer sun. and the bell of Goldau was ringing out its merry 
peal in the very face of the Rossberg, that seemed to look down 
with a stern and savage aspect on the ruin at his feet. The deep 
gash in his forehead and his riven side still remain as fresh as if 
made but yesterday. I wandered over the ground all ridged and 
oroken, just as it was at the close of that terrible day, with feel- 
ings of the profoundest melancholy. A few scattered houses had 
been built on the debris of rocks and stone, and here and there 



TRADITION OF LAKE L0WER1Z. 



was a mockery of a garden, which the unconscious husbandman 
was endeavouring to till above the bones of his father. A gloom 
rests on all the valley, and Rossberg seems sole monarch here. 

" Mountains liave fallen 

Leaving a gap in the clouds, and with the shock 
, Rocking their Alpine brethren, filling, up 

f The ripe green Tallies with destruction's splinters, 

Damming the rivers with a sudden dash, 
Which crushed the waters into mist, and made 
Tiieir fountains find another channel : thus — 
Thus, in its old age, did Mount Rossberg." 

On the island of Schwanau, in Lake Lowertz, is the ruin of a 
castle destroyed by the Swiss to revenge the violence done by its 
ovvner to a young woman. There is a tradition attached to it 
wild enough to form the ground-work of half a dozen novels. It 
is said that once a year shrieks are heard to ring from it, and 
immediately after, the ghost of the old villain shoots by, pressed 
hard after b}- the spirit of the pale, wronged girl, bearing a torch 
in her hand, and screaming terrirically on his flying traces. For 
a Vvhile he escapes his frail pursuer, but at length she forces him 
into the lake, where he sinks with hideous groans. A wild chaos 
of tones and fearful yells rings up from the shore as the waves 
close over him, and the scene is ended. The good people need 
not be so anxious to insure the doom of the old wretch. The 
Fpirit of that pale girl is avenged without all this trouble, and the 
v.aves that close over him are more terrible than the waters of 
Lowertz. 

I walked from Goldau to Arth all alone, and amused myself 
Vvith v.-atching the groups of peasantry that constantly passed me 
Avith curious looks. It was some fete day, and they were all clad 
in their holiday dresses, and went smiling on, as cheerful as the 
bright day about them. They would accost me in the most plea- 
jjant manner, and I was constantly greeted with " guten morgcn" 
cr " gut Tag," that made me feel as if I were among friends. 
As I entered the hotel at Arth, the first thing that met my eye 
was my trunk. Its familiar look was as welcome as the face of 
a friend; and, childish as it may seem, I felt less solitary than 
when sad and alone I entered the qui^t inn. 



i 



ZWINGLI. 79 



There is an excellent arrangement in Switzerland, by which 
one can mail his baggage as he can a letter, to any town on the 
mail route in the whole country. The traveller enters his differ- 
ent articles, takes his ticket, and then starts off into the Alps, 
and is gone for two months without the least concern. My cork 
sole boots, with which I had climbed every pass, gave out at Gol- 
JaUj but by dint of strings, etc., I made them do till I reachea 
Arth, where 1 was compelled to abandon the trustiest companions 
of all my travels ; and left them standing in the inn, with their 
tops leaning over one side, in the most dolorous, reproachful man- 
ner imaginable. It is curious how one becomes attached to every 
thing he carries about him in the Alps. I have known the most 
unsentimental men carry their Alpine stock across the Atlantic 
with them. 

The ride through the canton of Zug to Zurich was one of the 
pleasantest I took in Switzerland, and I verily believe this is one 
of the most beautiful cantons in it. There was a neatness in the 
dwellings and costumes of the inhabitants I had not noticed before. 
I passed by the spot where Zwingli the Reformer fell, in the 
midst of his flock, transfixed by a sword ; and by the monument 
erected to commemorate the place where Henry Von Hunenberg 
shot an arrow from the Austrian lines into the Swiss camp bearing 
the sentence " Beware of Mortgarten." The Swiss took the 
advice, and won the battle, and their descendants have reared 
this memento of the bold young patriot. Before entering Zurich, 
as we came in sight of the lake almost its entire length, I had 
one of the finest lake views I ever beheld. The beautiful shores 
sprinkled with white dwellings ; the town itself, and its gardens, 
and the distant mountains, combined to render it a perfect picture. 
Zurich is a pleasant town, and reminded me more of home than 
any place on the continent. Its white dwellings surrounded with 
gardens and grounds, carried me back in a moment to New Eng- 
land. I spent the Sabbath here, and was surprised to find in Ihis 
borne of Zwingli — this Protestant canton — so little respect paid 
to its sanctity. Towards evening the military were reviewed 
on the public square, while on one sid_e was a public exhibition of 
rope-dancers and tumblers, and among the tumblers two rosy- 
cheeked peasant girls. This is a Protestant canton indeed. 



80 SABBATH IN ZURICH. 

Protestant it may be, but this was no Protestant Sabbath. Yet, 
externally, Zurich is one of the pleasantest towns in Switzerland. 
The views around it are beautiful, while the rural aspect of the 
whole gives it a charm few Swiss villages possess. I love the 
land of the bold Swiss ; I love its lakes and snow-peaks and 
smiling vallies ; but alas for its inhabitants. Their glory is in 
the past, and their stern integrity too. It seems impossible that 
any people should long retain simplicity and purity of character 
in the heart of Europe. The influence of the corrupt nations is 
too great, especially when the contact is so frequent as now. 



FORMATION OF AVALANCHES. 81 



XV. 



AVALANCHES AND GLACIERS, THEIR FORMA- 
TION AND MOVEMENT. 



Before taking leave of Switzerland, it may be interesting to 
give some statistics of the Alps, though they are always after- 
thoughts with the traveller. I have hitherto endeavoured to give 
the effect of the scenery one meets in the Alps rather than detailed 
descriptions of it. 

Avalanches are regarded by many as immense masses of snow 
of a somewhat globular form, which gath«r as they roll till they 
acquire the size of a miniature mountain, and are more terrible 
to see even, than to hear. This is true of many of those which 
fall in winter, but not of those which descend in spring and early 
summer. The Swiss have different names for different kinds of 
avalanches. There is the Staublawinen, or dust avalanche, and 
Grundlawinen, or ground avalanche. The former is the falling 
of loose fresh-fallen snow. Gathering into huge drifts upon some 
peak till it is detached by its own weight ; it slides away until it 
reaches a precipice, when it commences rolling and thundering 
down the mountain. Increasing in bulk with every bound, and ex- 
tending farther and wider, it acquires at length an impetus and 
strength that sweep down whole forests, in its passage, as if the 
trees were slender reeds ; and moves across the entire valley, into 
which it lands. This, however, is not the most dangerous kind of 
avalanche, as it only buries people and cattle, and does not crush 
them ; so that they can frequently be dug out again without serious 
injury. The Grundlawinen, on the other hand, is a more serious 
matter. It falls in the springtime, and is dislodged by the action 
of sun, south winds, and rain. These thawing the upper surface, 



82 DESCENT OF AVALANCHES. 

the water trickles down throiigli tlie crevices, increasing their 
width and depth, till huge blocks, indeed immense precipices, are 
sawn loose by this slow process ; and tipping over or sHding away, 
come with the might of fate itself down the precipitous sides of 
the mountain. A village disappears in their path in a breath — treis 
three feet in diameter are snapped off like pipe stems, and nothing 
but a wild ruinous w^aste is left where they sweep in their wrath. As 
1 mentioned before, these avalanches have paths they travel regu- 
larly as deer. This is indicated by the shape of the mountains, 
and if the path comes straight on the site of a village, the inhabi- 
tants build strong parapets of mason work, against which the ava- 
lanches may thunder and accumulate. These prove sometimes, 
however, too weak for the falling mass, and are borne away in their 
headlong sweep, adding still greater ruin and terror to their march. 
The village I saw crushed in the pass of the Tete JN'^oire had such 
a wall built behind its church to protect it. For a long time it 
withstood the shock of the avalanches that fell against it, but one 
night there came one too strong to be resisted, and bore away par- 
apet, church, hamlet and all. The wind caused by an avalanche 
in its passage is sometimes terrific. A blast is generated by the 
rapid motion of the headlong mass, like that created by a cannon 
ball in its descent, which extends to some distance both sides of it, 
and bears down trees and whirls them like feathers through 
the atmosphere. A church spire was once blown down by one 
that fell a quarter of a mile off. These masses of ice and snow 
sometimes fill up immense gorges, and are bored through by the 
torrent, forming a natural bridge, over which the peasants drive 
their cattle the entire summer. The Swiss have their " sacred 
groves," which are the forests that are left standing on a moun- 
tain side above a hamlet to protect it from avalanches. 

Those which fall in early summer are attended with very little 
danger, as they usually descend in abysses where no traveller 
ever goes. They are seen at a distance, and hence have none 
of the appearance commonly supposed to belong to an avalanche. 
You hear first a rumbling sound, which soon swells to a full, 
though distant thunder tone ; and in turning your eye towards the 
spot whence the sound proceeds, you see sometliing which appears 
like a small white rivulet pouring down the mountain side, now 



FORMATION OF GLACIEKS. 83 

disappearing in some ravine, and now reappearing on the edge 
of some cliff over which it runs, and falls with headlong speed 
and increased roar, till it finally lands in a deep abyss. You 
wonder at first how so small a movement can create so deep and 
startling a sound ; but in that apparently small rivulet are rolling 
whole precipices of ice, wilh a rapidity and power that nothing 
could resist. Yet these terrible visitants become as familiar to 
the Swiss as our own rain-storms to us. The peasantry wait their 
regular descent in the spring as indications that winter is over. 
Those which are loosened by the human voice or the jingling of 
bells are so nicely balanced at the time, that it requires but the 
slightest change or shock in the atmosphere to destroy their 
equilibrium. 

Glaciers are the everlasting drapery of the Alps, clothing 
them in summer and winter with their robes of ice. They are 
formed by the successive thawing and freezing of the loose snov/ 
m spring and summer. Melting in the daytime and freezing at 
night, the whole mass at length becomes crystalized ; — and as the 
lower extremities melt in summer, they gradually move down the 
mountain, carrying with them debris of rocks and stone, making 
a perfect geological cabinet of the hill it throws up. 

Glaciers begin at an elevation of about 8000 feet or a little 
less — above this are eternal snow fields. These gietschers or 
glaciers constitute one of the most striking features of Alpine 
scenery. Whether looked upon vvith the eye of a geologist, and 
the slow and mighty- process of renovation and destruction, con- 
templated, working on from the birth to the death of Time ; or 
whether regarded with the eye of a landscape painter, as they 
now clasp the breast of a bold peak in their shining embrace, and 
now stretch their icy arms far away into the mountains, and 
now plunge their glittering foreheads into the green valley— 
they are the same objects of intense interest, and ever fresh 
wonder. 

As they push down the declivities, the obstructions they meet 
with, and the broken surface over which they pass, throw them 
into every variety of shape. Tov/ers are suddenly squeezed up 
forty or fifty feet high, and precipices thrown out which topple over 
with the roar of thunder. Rocks or boulders that have been car 



84 CREVICES. 



ried away from their resting-places on the bosom of a glacier, 
protect the ice under them by their sliadow, while tlie surrounding 
mass gradually melts awa^v', leaving them standing on stately 
pedestals, huge block obelisks slowly travelling towards the val- 
ley. Vrhenever these descending masses enter a gorge in the 
mountains, they spread out into it, partially filling it up, and are 
called ice seas. The Mer de Glace of Chamouny is one of these. 
These large collections of ice are traversed by immense crevices, 
reaching hundreds of feet down, and revealing that beautiful 
ultra-marine colour which the Rhone has as it leaves Lake Gene- 
va. Through these fissures, streams flow in every direction, and 
collecting at the lower extremity of the glacier, under the roof of 
a huge cavern of their own making, flow off, a turbid torrent, into 
the valley. Into these crevices the snow frequently drifts, cho- 
king up the portion near the surface, thus making concealed pit- 
falls for the traveller, and sometimes even for the wary, bold 
chamois hunter. Above the glaciers, near the summit, one fre- 
quently meets with red snow. I have seen it myself, and noticed 
it when I was not looking for it. The colour is said to be pro- 
duced by a species of fungus called " Palmella Nivalis or Proto- 
cocus,"' which makes the snow itself its soil, and germinates and 
grows in imperceptible branches over the surface. The invisible 
threads reaching out in every direction give to the snow a deep 
crim.son blush, which, as the plant dies, changes into a dirty 
black. The number of glaciers in the Alps has been put by Ebel 
at four hundred, covering a surface of about three hundred and 
fifty square miles. But he might as well attempt to estimate tlie 
number and weight of all the avalanches that fall; for these gla- 
ciers are of all sizes, from a few rods to miles, and in every 
variety of shape and position. The one around the Finster- 
Aar-horn contains a hundred and twenty square miles. Tiie 
traveller sees, as at Grindelwald and Chamouni, only the 
branches, the mere arms of these mighty forms. Scientific men 
differ very much as to the relative thickness of glaciers, though 
they average probably not more than seventy or eighty feet. 
The Mer de Glace, where it pitches into the vale of Chamouni, ig 
a hundred and eighty feet thick. Some of these glaciers are of a 
cure white, and shine in the noonday sun with dazzling splendour, 



SOUNDS IN THE ALPS. 85 

but the greater part of them are covered with the debris of the 
mountains, giving them a dirty hue, wholly unlike the appearance 
one imagines they present, who has never seen them. The im- 
pression they make on the mind of the beholder, however, can 
never be effaced. The marks of power, of terrific struggles they 
carry about them, fill the mind with emotions of grandeur almost 
equal to the solitary avalanche and its lonely voice of thunder. 
They have a voice of their own, too, called by the mountaineers 
hrullcn (growlings), caused by the rending of the solid mass when 
the south-east wind breathes upon it. The lower portion of the 
Alps is full of sound and motion : even after you leave the tinkling 
of bells, the music of the horn and the bleaing of goats, there is 
the roar of the torrent, the shock of the avalanche, and the grind- 
ing, crushing sound of the mighty glacier. But when you ascend 
above these, all is still and silent as the sepulchre. Eternal sab- 
bath reigns around the peaks, and solitude deeper than the heart 
of the forest, embraces the subdued and humbled adventurer; 
while the sudden flight of a pheasant from amid the snow, or the 
slow and lordly sweep of the Lamergeyer, in his circles upward, 
startle the feelings into greater intensity. 

16 



88 AN ALPINE EMIGRANT. 



XVI. 

PASTURAGES, CHALETS, AND ALPINE PASSES. 



In passing through the higher Alps nothing has afforded me 
more pleasure than the green pasturages which, here and there, 
dot the savage landscape. Sometimes they have burst unexpect- 
edly on me, as the fierce Alpine storm-cloud rent above them, re- 
vealing for a moment a face of gentleness and beauty, and then 
veiling it again in impenetrable gloom ; and now greeting me 
from the precipitous side of some difficult pass ; yet always awa- 
kening the same emotions. The bold features of Alpine scenery 
and the strong contrasts presented by the quiet meadow spot 
and the cold white glaciers that lay their icy hands on its green 
bosom — the secure Ihtle hamlet, surrounded by the most savage and 
awful forms of nature— must make an ineffaceable impression on 
the heart of a Swiss mountaineer, and prevent, I should think, his 
ever being an emigrant. I am inclined to believe very few in 
proportion to the whole population ever do leave the region of the 
Alps. I remember finding a returned emigrant on the summit 
of the Righi. He had trinkets of various kinds to sell, made of 
wood and chamois horn, &c. I do not know how it happened, but 
I accidentally learned that he had once been to America, and was 
curious to learn what had brought him back. He liked the new 
country, he said, very well, but he liked the Alps better. "Oh," 
said he, " you have no Alps in America !" He could not forget 
the mountains ai7.d glaciers and pasturage of his native land, and 
I could not blame him. And yet the poetry of a Swiss mountain- 
eer's life is all in appearance and none in reality. So with the 
chalets and pasturages ; — they are picturesque things in the land- 



DESCRIPTION OF THE CHALET. 87 

scape, and there their beauty ends. The life of a Swiss herds- 
man is any thing but one of sentiment. The sound of his horn 
at sunrise, ringing through the sweet valley as he drives his flocks 
to pasture ; and the song of the " Ranz des vaches^' as the herds 
slowly wind along the mountain paths, are delightful to the ear. 
So is the tinkling of countless bells at evening, one of the pleasant- 
est sounds that was vvont to greet me in my wanderings in the 
Alps. But the herdsman thinks of none of these things. To 
gather together nearly a hundred cows twice a day, and milk 
them, and make the butter and cheese, and do all tlie outdoor 
work belonging to such a dairy, make his life one of constant toil. 
The chalet too, which is simply a Western log hut, built in exact- 
ly the same style, and loaded down with stone on the roof to keep 
it from being blown away by the Alpine blast, — though adding 
much to the scenery, is any thing but a comfortable home. A 
table and bench constitute the furniture — some loose straw above, 
the bed, while through the crevices on every side the wind and 
rain enter at their leisure. To complete the discomfort, the cattle 
are allowed to tread the ground around it into a barnyard. There 
are exceptions to this rule, but this is the common chalet which 
meets one at every turn on a Swiss pasturage. They are built 
with no reference to each other, but are scattered around on the 
slopes as if sieved down from above, and alighted where they did 
by the merest chance. The number that will be scattered around 
in a single valley is almost incredible. As I descended into Grin- 
delwald the thick sprinkling of these little low dark-looking cha- 
lets over the distant slopes produced a most singular effect. Their 
number seemed literally legion. There are fen tJiousand in the 
Simmenthal alone. 

In Switzerland, Alps signifies mountain pasturage, and is used 
m that sense. These Alps, or mountain pasturages, are some- 
limes private property, and sometimes the property of the village 
or commune. When owned by the latter, ever}' inhabitant is al- 
lowed to pasture a certain number of cattle for so many days upon 
it. I saw, near Grindelwald, one of these goverriment pasturages, 
and it was literally covered with cows. The valley furnishes the 
first pasture in the spring, and as the summer advances, and the 
higher pasturages become free of snow, the herds are driven up to 



68 MODE OF PASTURING CATTLE. 

liiem. Owners of a large number of catlle will have a chalet on 
every pasturage for their cowherd. 

In speaking of the customs of the Swiss in this respect, Latrobe 
says : " They stay on the first pasturages till about the lOlh or 
12th of June, when the cattle are driven to the middle range of 
pasturages. That portion of the herd intended for a summer 
campaign on the highest Alps remain here till the beginning of 
July, and, on the fourth of that month, generally ascend to them ; 
return to the middle range of pastures about seven or eight <\-eeks 
afterwards, spend there about fourteen days, or three weeks, to 
eat the after grass ; and finally return into the valleys about the 
10th or 11th of October, where they remain, in the vicinity of the 
villages, till driven by the snow and tempests of winter into the 
stables. 

" That portion of the cattle, on the other hand, which is not 
destined to pass the summer on the higher Alps, and are necessaiy 
for the supply of the village with milk and butter, descend from 
the middle pastures, on the fourth of July, into the valley, and 
consume the grass upon the pasturage belonging to the commune, 
till the winter drives th%m under shelter. The very highest Al- 
pine pasturages are never occupied more than three or four 
weeks.'"' 

I have already, in another place, spoken of the custom of dri- 
ving herds to the most inaccessible pasturages in midsummer. 
Herds are thus driven across the Mer de Glace, in July, to the 
pasturages beyond, though more or less cattle are lost in the 
crevices of the glaciers at every passage. 

Murray says that the best cheese is made " upon pastures 3000 
feet above the level of the sea, in the vales of Simraen, and Saa- 
nen, and Emmenthal. The best cows there yield, in summer, 
between twenty and forty pounds of milk daily, and each cow 
produces, by the end of the season of four months, on an average, 
two hundred weight of cheese." I have seen herds feeding six 
and seven thousand feet above the level of the sea. 

I ought to add, perhaps, in justice to tlie Swiss, that some 
of the chalets, are exceptions to those I described as being 
both uncomfortable and dirty, and are neat and tidy as a New 
England farm-house. The white table-cloth and clean though 



NUMBER OF ALPINE PASSES. 89 

rude furniture, and fresh butter and milk, and pleasant face of 
the hospitable mistress, make the traveller's heart leap within him, 
as, weary and cold, he crosses the threshold. 

I have spoken of several of the Alpine passes in detail, and re- 
fer to them now merely to state that there are fifty in Switzerland 
alone. Those roads constructed for carriages are not allowed to 
rise more than a certain number of feet to a mile. Distance 
seems not to have entered into the calculations of the engineers 
who built those monuments of human vskill — carriage roads over 
the Alps. They were after a certain grade, and they obtained it, 
though by contortions and serpentine windings that seem almost 
endless. Thus the Simplon averages nowhere more than one 
inch elevation to a foot, and, indeed, not quite that. Thirty thou- 
sand men were employed on this road six years. There are 611 
bridges in less than forty miles, ten galleries, and twenty houses 
of refuge, while the average width of the road is over twenty-five 
feet. The cost of the whole was about $1,200,000. The Splu- 
gen presents almost as striking features as the Simplon. From 
these facts some idea may be gathered of the stupendous work it 
must be to carry a carriage road over the Alps. 

In the winter they are all blocked up, and none but the bold 
foot traveller ventures on their track. The driving snow-storms 
and falling avalanches render them impassable to carriages, and 
perilous even to the accustomed mountaineer. I believe that the 
mail is carried over the Simplon, during the winter, by a man 
either on foot or with a mule. I think I have been told that he 
makes the passage twice a week, bringing to the hospice on the 
top the only news that reach it of the world below. For eight 
months in the year the inhabitants of the higher Alps might as 
well be out of the world, hr all knowledge they have of its doings 
and ways. 



90 LAST VIEW OF THE ALPS. 



XYII. 

A FAUEWELL TO SWITZERLAND-BASLE. 



The first view one gets of the Rhine in leaving Switzerland 
from the east is on his way from Zurich to Basle. Here, also, 
he takes his farewell look of the Alps. From the top of the 
Botzberg the whole range of the Bernese Alps rises on the view. 
Amid the scenes in which he has moved since he left their pres- 
ence, the traveller almost forgot their existence, and as they here 
rise again on his vision, the}^ bring back a world of associations 
to his heart. There they stand leaning against the distant sky, 
like the forms of friends he has left forever. Such were my feel- 
ings as I sat down by the road-side, under as bright a sky as ever 
bent over the vineyards of Italy, and looked off upon those bold 
peaks which had become to me objects of affection. A few days 
only had clasped since I was amid their terror and their beauty. 
I had seen the moonbeams glancing on their glaciers at midnight, 
and heard the music of their torrents lifting up their voices from 
the awful abysses. I had seen the avalanche bound from their 
precipices, and rush, smoking and thundering, into the gulfs below 
— and been wrapt in their storms and clouds. I had toiled and 
struggled through their snow drifts, and stood enraptured on their 
green pasturages, while the music of bells, the bleating of flocks, 
and the clear tones of the Alp-horn made it seem like a dream- 
land to me. A mere dwarf in comparison, I had moved and 
mused amid those terrific forms. Now mellowed and subdued by 
distance, the vast, white, irregular mass, lay like a monster dream- 
ing in the blue mist. Clouds resting below the summit, slept iioro 
and there a?ong the range, and all was silent and beautiful. I 
love nature always, but especially in these her grander and no- 



A LEGEND. 91 



bier aspects. The Alps had lain along the horizon of my imag- 
ination from childhood up. The desire of years had at length 
been fulfilled, and I had wandered amid the avalanches and gla- 
ciers and snow-fields and cottages of the Oberland, and now I was 
taking my last look. It was with feelings of profound melancholy 
I turned away from St. Peters and the Duomo of Milan, feeling 
[ should see their magnificent proportions no more. But it was 
with still sadder feelings I gazed my farewell on the glorious 
Alps. 

On this route, within half a mile of Brugg, is a lunatic asylum, 
once the Abbey of Koenigsfelden,. (King's field,) which the guide 
book informs you was founded in 1310, by Empress Elizabeth, 
and Agnes, Queen of Hungary, on the spot where the Emperor 
Albert, the husband of the former and father of the latter, was as- 
sassinated. Leaving his suite on the opposite bank, he had cross- 
ed the river Reuss at this point, with only the four conspirators 
accompanying him. The principal one, John of Sv/abia, was 
the nephew of Albert, and was incited to this deed from being 
kept out of his paternal inheritance by his uncle. He struck 
first, and sent his lance through the Emperor's throat. Boim then 
pierced him through and through with his sword, while Walter 
von Eschenbach cleaved his skull in twain with a felling stroke. 
Wart, the fourth conspirator, took no part in the murder, and yet, 
by a singular providence, was the only one that was ever caught 
and executed for the deed. The others escaped, although the 
King's attendants were in sight. Indeed the latter was so alarm- 
ed they took to flight, leaving their master to die alone, sustained 
and cheered only by a poor peasant girl, who held the royal dy- 
ing head upon her bosom. 

" Alone she sate : from hill and wood low sunk the mournful sun ; 
Fast gushed the fount of noble blood ; treason its worst had done. 
With her long hair she vainly pressed the wounds to staunch their tide : 
Unknown, on that meek humble breast imperial Albert died." 

On the friends and families of these murderers the children of 
Albert wreaked a most bloody vengeance. The remotest relative 
was hunted down and slain, and every friend offered up as a vic- 
tim to revenge, till one thousand is supposed to have fallen. Queen 



92 SABBATH IN BASLE. 



Agnes was accustomed to witness the executions, and seemed ac« 
tuated by the spirit of a fiend while the horrid butchery was go. 
ing on. On one occasion she saw sixty-throe, one after another 
slain, and in the midst of the bloody spectacle exclaimed, " Noio 
I bathe in May -dew. ^' This convent of Koenigsfelden was en- 
dowed with the confiscated property of these murdered men, and 
here she ended her days. But her religious seclusion, prayers 
and almsgiving were powerless to wipe the blood from her con- 
science. The ghosts of her murdered and innocent victims rose 
up before her guilty spirit, and frightened peace from her bosom. 
Revenge had been gratified ; but she forgot that after it has been 
glutted with victims, it always turns round and gnaws at the heart 
which gave it birth. When she came to die, and the vision of 
that terrible and just tribunal that awaited her passed before her 
trembling spirit, she sent for a priest to give her absolution. 
" Woman," he replied, " God is not to be served with bloody 
hands, nor by the slaughter of innocent persons, nor by convents 
built v/ith tlie plunder of widows and orphans, — but by mercy 
and forgiveness of injuries." Switzerland is full of these wild 
tales. They meet you at every turn ; and you often start to be 
told you are standing on the grave of a murderer. 

Basle is the last town in Switzerland standing on the Rhine at 
the head of navigation. It contains a little over 21,000 inhabi- 
tants, an J is well worth a longer stay than the thousands of trav- 
ellers who yearly pass through ever give it. It was once one 
of the strictest of the Swiss cities in its sumptuary laws. Every 
person on the Sabbath, who went to church, was compelled to 
dress in black ; no carriage could enter the town after ten at 
night, and the luxury of a footman was forbidden. A set of of- 
ficers called Unzichterherrn decided the number of dishes and the 
wines to be used at a dinner party, and also the cut and quality 
of all the clothes worn. Until fifty years ago, the time-pieces of 
this town were an hour in advance of all others in Europe. Tra- 
dition states that this curious custom had its origin in the deliver- 
ance of the place once from a band of conspirators by the town 
clock striking one instead of twelve. But the Swiss have a tra- 
dition to establish every custom. There is a curious head attach- 
ed to the clock tower standing on the bridge which connects the 



METHODISM IN BASLE. 93 

two towns. The movement of the pendulum causes a long tongue 
to protrude, and the eyes to roll about — " making faces," it is said, 
" at Little Basle on the opposite side of the river." 

Since the Reformation Basle has been the principal seat of 
Methodism in Switzerland. Formerly the citizens exhibited their 
piety in odd mottoes and doggrels placed over their doors in the 
public streets. These, of course, no longer remain, and the peo- 
ple are any thing but religious. Two of these strange mottoes 
we give from the guide book as a specimen of the pious Metiiodists 
of that time : 

" Auf Gott ich meine HofFaung bau 
Und wohne in der Alien Sau." 
In God my hope of grace I big, 
And dwell within the Ancient Pig. 

" Wacht auf ihr Menschen und that Buss 
Ich heis-3 zum goldenen Rinderfuss." 
Wake and repent your sins with grief, 
I'm called the golden Slain of Beef. 

This was a queer mode of publishing to the traveller one's relig- 
ious opinions, but it shows to what ridiculous extremes fanaticism 
will carry a man. To the credit of the place I will say, however, 
that even now a carriage arriving at the gates of the town during 
church time on the Sabbath is compelled to wait there till service 
is over. 

Here one begins to think of the Rhine, "the glorious Rhine." 
It goes rushing and foaming through Basle as if in haste to reach 
the vine-clad shores of Germany. The traveller, as he sees its 
waters darting onward, imbibes a portion of their anxiety, and ig 
in haste to be borne along on their bosom to the sliore belaw, so 
rich in associations and so marked in the history of man. 



94 SWISS CROSS-BOWS. 



XYIII. 

STEASBOURG-THE RHINE-FEANEJOET. 



OxE is constantly shown choice relics in passing through 
Switzerland, as well as in passing over Italy. Some, doubtless, 
are genuine, but icliich are so is the trouble. Thus, at Lucerne, 
in the public archives, I was shown the very sword William 
Tell was accustomed to swing before him in battle, and the very 
cross-bow from which he hurled the bolt into the tyrant's bosom. 
Both, however, are apocryphal. I forgot to mention, by the way, 
that these old Swiss cross-bows are not our Indian bows, but what 
school-boys call cross-guns. The bow, frequently made of steel, 
is fastened to a stock, and the arrow is launched along a groove. 
The bows of many of these are so stiff that it was with difficulty 
I could make them spring at all with my utmost strength. I 
might as well have pulled on a bar of iron. The stiffest of them 
even the strong-limbed mountaineer could not span with his un- 
aided strength, and was compelled to have cog wheels and a small 
crank attached to the stock, by winding which he was enabled to 
spring the bow. He thus accumulated tremendous force on the 
arrow, and when it was dismissed it went with the speed and 
power of a bullet. At Basle there is a large collection of relics, 
made by a private gentleman, who has sunk his fr. rtune in it. 
Among other things are Bonaparte's robe worked by Josephine, 
in which he was crowned at Milan, and a neat rose- wood dressing 
case of the Empress, containing fifty secret drawers. 

But not to stop here, we will away down tiie Rhine. The 
river is here shallow and bad to navigate, and so I took the rail, 
road to Strasbourg, the lofty spire of whose cathedral rises to 



STRASBOURG CATHEDRAL. 95 

view long before the traveller reaches the town. This cathedral 
or minster is one of the finest Gothic buildings in Europe, and 
has the loftiest spire in the world, it being four hundred and 
seventy-four feet above the pavement. It is formed of stone and 
yet open like frost-work, and looks from below like a delicate 
cast iron frame. Yet there it stands and has stood, with the wind 
whistling through its open-work for centuries. Begun about the 
time of the Crusades by Erwin of Steinbach, it was continued 
by his son, and afterwards by his daughter, and after that by 
others, and was finally finished 424 years after its foundation. I 
am not going to describe it ; but just stand outside, by the was* 
end, and cast your eye over the noble face it presents. Over the 
solid part of the wall is thrown a graceful net- work of arcades and 
pillars, formed of stone, yet so delicately cut that it seems a cast- 
ing fastened on the surface. In the centre is a magnificent cir- 
cular window, like a huge eye, only it is Jifiy feet across, while 
the body of the building itself towers away 230 feet above you, 
or nearly as high as Trinity church, steeple and all, will be when 
finished. And over all is this beautiful netting of stone. When 
Trinity church is completed, clap another just like it, spire and all, 
on the top of its spire, and you have some conception of the man- 
ner the Strasbourg Minster lifts its head into the heavens. Among 
other things in the interior is the famous clock, which, till lately, 
has for a long time remained silent, because no mechanist could 
be found of sufficient skill to arrange its elaborate interior. It is 
about the size of a large organ, and tells not only the time of the 
day, but the changes of the seasons — exhibits the different phases 
of the moon — the complicated movements of the planets, bringing 
about in iheir appointed time the eclipses of the sun and jnoon, 
besides playing several tunes and performing various marches by 
way of pastime. It is a time-keeper, astronomer, almanac, 
mathematician, and musician at the same time. Every hour a 
procession appears on its face marching round to the sound of 
music, with some striking figure in the foreground. Wb waited 
to notice one performance, and the chief personage that came out 
to do us honour was old Father Time, with his scythe over his 
shoulder, and his head bowed down in grief, looking as if he were 
striking his last hour. Here lies Qberlin, and about a mile and 



96 PATE DE FOIES GRAS. 

a half distant, at Waldbach, is his house and library, standing 
just as he left them. 

Here for the first time I noticed the storks sitting quietly in 
their nests on the tops of the lofty chimnies, or stepping with their 
long legs and outstretched necks around on their perilous prome- 
nade. There is one street in this town called Brand Strasse (Fire 
Street), from the fact that in 1348 a huge bonfire was made where 
it runs, to burn the Hebrews; and 2,000 were consumed, for hav- 
ing, as it was declared, poisoned the wells and fountains of the 
town. Ah ! almost all Europe has been one wide Brand Strasse 
to this unfortunate people. 

Strasbourg is the great market for paies defoies gras, made, as 
it is known, of the livers of geese. These poor creatures are shut 
up in coops so narrow they cannot turn round in them, and then 
stuffed twice a day with Indian corn, to enlarge their livers, which 
have been known to swell till they reached the enormous weiglit 
of two pounds and a half. Garlick steeped in water is given them 
to increase their appetites. This invention is worthy of the French 
nation, where cooks are great as nobles. 

From this place to Mayence, down the Rhine, there is nothing 
of interest except the old city of Worm.s, immortal for the part it 
played in the Reformation. It is now half desolate, but I looked 
upon it with the profoundest emotions. Luther rose before me 
with that determined brow and strange, awful eye of his, before 
which the boldest glance went down. I seemed to behold him as 
he approached the thronged city. Every step tells on the fate of 
a world, and on the single will of that single man rests the whole 
Reformation. But he is firm as truth itself, and in the regular 
beatings of that mighty heart, and the unfaltering step of that fear- 
less form, the nations read their destiny. The Rhine is lined with 
battle fields, and mighty chieftains lie along its banks ; but there 
never was the march of an army on its shores, not even when 
Bonaparte trod there with his strong legions, so sublime and awful 
as the approach of that single man to Worms. The fate of a na- 
tion hung on the tread of one — that of the world on the other. 
Crowns and thrones were carried by the former — the freedom of 
mankind by the latter. What is the headlong valour of Bonaparte 
on the bridge of Lodi, the terrible charge of McDonald at Wag- 



LUTHER. 97 



ram, or Ney at Waterloo, compared to the steady courage of this 
fearless man, placing himself single-handed against kings and 
princes, and facing down the whole visible church of God on 
earth, with its prisons and torture and death placed before him. 
But there was a mightier power at work within him than human 
will or human courage — the upstaying and uplifting spirit of God 
bearing on the heart with its sweet promise, and nerving it with 
its divine strength, till it could throb as calmly in the earthquake 
as in the sunshine. Still his was a bold spirit, daring all and 
more than man dare do. 

The Rhine here is a miserable stream enough, flowing amid 
low marshy islands, and over a flat country, so that you seem to 
be moving through a swamp rather than down the most beautiful 
river of Europe. The boat will now be entangled in a perfect 
crowd of these mud islands till there seems no way of escape, and 
now, caui::ht in a current, go dashing straight on to another ; and 
just when the crash is expected, and you are so near you could 
easily leap ashore, it shoots away like an arrow, and floats on the 
broad lake-like bosom of the stream. Nothing can be more stupid 
than the descent of the Rhine to Mayence. 

Here I crossed the river and took cars for Frankfort-on-the- 
Maine. Here, also, I first noticed those huge rafts of timber 
which are brought from the mountains of Germany and floated 
down to Holland. One was moving down towards the bridge, 
four hundred feet long, and nearly three hundred wide, sprin- 
kled over with the cabins of the navigators, who, with their fam- 
ilies, amounted to between two and three hundred persons. I 
supposed the spectacle of such immense masses of floating timber 
was one of the peculiar features of our western world, and I did 
not expect such a wild and frontier scene here on the Rhine. 

There are three classes of cars on the railroad to Frankfort. 
The first is fitted up for the delicate tastes of noble blood, though 
free to all. The second is better than any railroad carriage I 
ever saw at home, and the third very passable. Taking the sec- 
ond as more becoming my rank, I sped off" for Frankfort. Of 
this free town I will say only that the belt of shrubbery and flow- 
ers going entirely round it, with carriage drives and promenades 
between, looks like a beautiful wreath encircling it, and occupy. 



98 MOTHER OF THE ROTHSCHILDS. 

ing as it does the place of the old line of forts, is a sweet emblem 
of the change that is yet to come over the cities of the world from 
the peaceful influence of the gospel. The two things that inter- 
ested me most were, the house in which Goethe was born, showing 
by its fine exterior that poverty was not the inheritance of one 
poet at least, — and the Jews' street, at one end of which stands 
the palace of the Rothschilds. The Jews here, as every where, 
are old clothes men, and the street is black with garments liang- 
ing before the dwellings to tempt the purchaser. The Rothschilds 
have built their palace at the end of the street, hut facing one of 
the most fashionable streets of the town. Thus they stand with 
one foot among the Jews and the other among Christians. I was 
struck with one little incident illustrating the tenacity with which 
a Hebrew clings to his despised people. The mother of the 
Rothschilds still lives among the old clothes in the midst of her 
kindred, and steadily refuses to dwell with her children in their 
magnificent palace. Like Ruth she says to her people, " Where 
thou goest I will go, and thy God shall be my God." I love this 
strong affection for her persecuted race, choosing, as it does, 
fhame and disgrace with them, rather than honour and riches with 
the world. Even here, in this enlightened town, until eleven 
years ago, there was an edict in force restricting the number of 
marriages among the Hebrews to thirteen per year. 



MINERAL SPRINGS OF WEISBADEN. 



XIX. 

A DAY IN WIESBADEN 



Wiesbaden is the Saratoga of Germany and the chief town in 
the Duchy of Nassau. The Duke is the King of this little prov- 
ince containing 355,715 inhabitants, of whom a little over half 
are Protestants, 5,845 Jews, and the rest Catholics. This small 
duchy is filled with Brunnens, or bubbling springs ; but before I 
give a description of them, let me sketch a day in Wiesbaden. 
At five o'clock in the morning, the servant, in obedience to my 
orders, knocked at my door, and with a bright sun just rising over 
the Taunus mountains to greet me, I threaded my way to the hot 
springs, a short distance from the centre of the village. A crowd 
had arrived before me, and were scattered around over the open 
area, or passing up and down the promenades, carrying a glass of 
the steaming water in their hands, waving it backwards and for- 
wards in the morning air, and blowing upon the surface to cool it 
for drinking. This water is so hot it cannot be drank for some 
time after it is dipped up, and the vessel containing it cannot be 
grasped for a single moment in the hand. A handle, therefore, is 
attached to all the vessels, in which each invalid receives his por- 
tion of the scalding fluid. I stood for a long time convulsed with 
laughter at the scene that opened before me as I approached this 
spring, notwithstanding the sobering effects of the early morning 
air. Now an old man tottered away from the steaming spring, 
bowing over his glass, which he held with trembling hand close 
to his face, and blowing with the most imperturbable gravity and 
dolorous countenance on the scalding fluid. Close behind him 
shot along a peppery Frenchman, puffing away at his drink, and 
swinging it backwards and forwards with such velocity and abru}^. 



100 MANNER OF DRINKING THE WATER. 

ness, that a portion of the hot water at length spilled over on his 
hand, when he dropped the vessel as if he had been bitten by a 
snake, and, with a dozen sacres, stood scowling over the broken 
fragments that lay scattered at his feet. Old and young women 
were walking along the promenades utterly absorbed in their cup 
of boiling water, which it required the nicest balancing to keep 
from spilling over. This intense attention of so many people to 
the single object of keeping their cups right end up, and yet swing 
them as far and rapid as possible in order to cool the water, was 
irresistibly comical. Almost every man's character could be dis- 
cerned in the way he carried his cup, and the success which at- 
tended his operations. Your quiet lazy man sat down on a bench, 
put his vessel beside him, and crossing his legs, waited with the 
most composed mien the sure operation of the laws of nature to 
cool his dose, while the ardent impatient personage kept shaking 
and blowing his tumbler, and sipping every now and then, to the 
no slight burning of his lips. 

After having watched for a^ while this to me novel spectacle, I 
stepped up to the spring and received from a young girl my por- 
tion of this boiling broth, and commenced my promenade, present- 
ing, probably, to some other traveller, as ridiculous a figure as 
those who had just excited my mirth exhibited to me. 

The taste of this water, when partially cooled, is precisely like 
chicken hroih. Says a humorous English traveller, of this spring, 
(Sir Francis Head,) " If I were to say that, while drinking it, one 
hears in one's ears the cackling of hens, and tiiat one sees feath- 
ers flying before one's eyes, I should certainly greatly exaggerate ; 
but when I declare that it exactly resembles very hot chicken 
broth, I only say what Dr. Grenville said, and what, in fact, every 
body says, and must say, respecting it, and certainly I do wonder 
why the common people should be at the inconvenience of making 
bad soup, when they can get much better from nature's great 
stock-pot, the Kochbrunnen of Wiesbaden. At all periods of the 
year, summer and winter, the temperature of this broth remains 
the same ; and when one reflects that it has been bubbling out of 
the ground, and boiling over, in the very same state, certainly 
from the time of the Romans, and probably from the time of the 
flood, it is really astonishing what a most wonderful apparatus 



THE KUR SAAL. iOl 



there must exist below, what an inexhaustible stock of provisions 
to ensure such an everlasting supply of broth always formed of 
the same eight or ten ingredients, always salted to exactly the 
same degree, aad always served up at exactly the same heat. 
One would think that some of the particles in the recipe would 
be exhausted : in short, to speak metaphorically, that the chickens 
would at last be boiled to rags, or that the fire would go out for 
want of coals ; but the oftener one reflects on this sort of subjects, 
the oftener is the oldfashioned observation forced upon the mind, 
that let a man go where he will, Omnipotence is never from his 
view," 

This water, like that of Saratoga, is good for every thing : for 
those too fat and those too lean, for those too hot and those too 
cold, for all ages and conditions and sexes. After having swal- 
lowed a sufficient quantity of this broth, and what is better still, 
a good breakfast, I wandered two miles, through shaded walks, 
from the Kur Saal to the picturesque ruins of Sonnenberg Castle. 
Lying down under its shady trees, and away from the noise of 
the bustling little village. I forgot for a while, Wiesbaden, Koch- 
brunnen, chicken broth, and all. 

This Kur Saal is a magnificent hotel, built by the Duke, and 
capable of seating several hundred at dinner. The main saloon 
is 130 feet long, 60 wide, and 50 feet high. The price for dinner 
is the very reasonable sum of some thirty-four or five cents. 
Back of this building is an open area with seats in it, where hun- 
dreds, after dinner, sit and drink coffee ; and farther on, a passa- 
ble pond, beautiful shrubbery, and countless walks. I hardly 
know a pleasanter spot to spend a week or two in than Wies- 
baden, were it not for the gambling tliat is constantly practised. 
In the public rooms of the Kur Saal are roulette tables and other 
apparatus for gambling, which after dinner, and especially in the 
evening, are surrounded with persons of both sexes, most of 
whom stake more or less money. Directly opposite me at dinner, 
sat a young man whose countenance instantly attracted my at^ 
tention. He was very pale and thin, while his cold blue eye 
high cheek bones, and almost marble whiteness and hardness of 
features, together with a sullen, morose aspect, made me shrink 
from him as from some deadly thing. Added to all this, when 



10-2 A GAMBLER. 



he rose from the table, I sa^v he had an ugly limp, which mada 
him seem more unnatural and monster-like than before. 

Wandering soon after through the rooms, seeing ■what was to 
be seen, I came to a roulette table around which were gathered 
gentlemen and ladies of all nations and ages, some of them sta- 
king small sums apparently for mere amusement. Just then, this 
sullen cadaverous looking young man came limping up, and de 
posited a roll of twenty Napoleons or abont SSO. A single turn 
of the wheel, and it was lost. He quietly drew forth another 
roll, which was also quickly lost. Without the least agitation or 
apparent excitement he thus continue'd to draw forth one roll af- 
i:er another till ten of them or about 8S00 were gone. He then 
as quietly, and without saying a single word, limped away. He 
had not spoken or changed a muscle the whole time, and mani- 
fested no more anxiety or regret than if he had lost only so many 
pennies. " There," said I to myself, as he sauntered away, 
'• goes a professed gambler, and he has all the qualities for a suc- 
cessful one. Perfectly cool and self-possessed under the most 
provoking reverses, he does not get angry and rave at fickle, per- 
verse fortune, but takes it all as a matter of business." I then 
knew, for the first time, why I felt such an antipath}- towards 
him. A gambler carries his repulsive soul in his face, in his 
eye, nay, almost in his very gait. He makes a chilling atmos- 
phere around him that repels every one that approaches him. 
Gambling seems to metamorphose a man more than any other 
crime except murder. 

But let us away from this contaminating influence, and forth 
into God's beautiful world — into the forest, and beauty and bloom 
of nature, where one can breathe free again, and feel the sooth- 
ing and balmy influence of the summer wind as it creeps over 
the mountain ridges. The sun is stooping to the western world, 
hasting, as it were, to my own beloved land, and the dark forests 
of the Taunus seem to wave an invitation to their cool shades. 

Taking a guide with me, I mounted a donkey and stained for 
*' Die Platte," or the duke's hunting seat, four miles distant, on 
the very summit of the Taunus. For a long while we trotted 
along together, when, all at once, a flock of deer burst from the 
thicket, and bounded across our path. Going a little way into the 



HUNTING CHATEAU. 103 

Wood, they stopped, and allowed me to urge ray donkey to within 
a few rods of them. Indeed they seemed almost as tame as sheep. 
I asked my guide what would be the penalty if he should shoot 
one of those deer. " Three years' imprisonment," he replied. 
*' In my country," said I, "there are plenty of deer, and you can 
shoot one down wherever you find it. and have it after it is killed." 
He looked at me a moment, in astonishment^ and then simply said, 
" That must be a strange country." A strange country indeed 
to him, who was going through a wide unbroken forest, and yet 
could not even take a wild bird's nest without paying a fine of five 
florins. At length we reached the duke's hunting seat, a white 
cubic building, standing alone and naked on the very summit of 
the hill. Two huge bronze stags stand at the entrance, while 
immense antlers are nailed up in every part of the hall, and 
along the staircase, with a paper under each, telling that it was 
shot by the duke, and the date of the remarkable achievement. I 
could not but smile at this little piece of ostentation, as I had just 
seen how difficult it must be to kill one of these deer. I had rode 
on horseback (or, rather, donkeyback) to within pistol shot of four 
as fine fellows as ever tossed their antlers through the forest, and 
then was ccmpelled to halloo to frighten them away. I am afraid 
the duke would hardly show as many trophies if compelled to hunt 
his game in our primeval forests. The chief room of this building 
is circular, and has a row of antlers going entirely around it, 
halfway up the lofty ceiling ; while every piece of furniture in 
it — chairs, sofas, stools, and all — are made of deer' horns in their 
natural state. I suppose they must have been steamed and bent 
into the very convenient shapes they certainly present. The 
cushions are all made of tanned deer-skins, adorned with hunttnsr 
scenes, forest landscapes, &c. From the top of this hunting 
chateau I saw the glorious Rhine, flowing, in a waving line, 
through the landscape, while cultivated fields and vineyards, and 
forest-covered hills, and old castles, and towers, and cottages 
spread away on the excited vision in all the irregular harmony 
of nature ; and the glorious orb of day threw its farewell light over 
the whole, as it dropped to its repose over distant France. I turn- 
ed back to Wiesbaden, through the deepening shades of the forest, 



104 A LADY GAMBLER. 



greeted ever and anon, by the flitting form of a noble deer, as he 
bounded away to his evening shelter. 

At night the Kur Saal is thronged with persons of both sexes ; — • 
and, as I strolled through it, I came again upon a gambling table, 
around which were sitting gentlemen and ladies of every age and 
nation. English girls were teasing their " papas" for a few sove- 
reigns to stake on the turning of a card, and old men were watch- 
ing the changes of the game with all the eagerness of youth. 
One lady, in particular, attracted my attention. She was from 
Belgium, and her whole appearance indicated a person from the 
upper ranks of society. To an elegant form she added a com- 
plexion of incomparable whiteness, which contrasted beautifully 
with her rich auburn tresses that flowed in ample ringlets around 
her neck. Clad in simple white, and adorned with a profusion of 
jewels, she took her seat by the table, while her husband stood 
behind her chair ; and, with her delicate white hand on a pile of 
money before her, entered at once into the excitement of the game. 
As she sat, and with her small rake drew to her, or pushed from 
her, the money she won or lost, I gazed on her with feelings with 
which I had never before contemplated a woman. I did not think 
it was possible for an elegant and well-dressed lady to fill me with 
feelings of such utter disgust. Her very beauty became ugliness, 
and her auburn tresses looked more unbecoming than the elfin 
locks of a sorceress. Her appearance and her occupation pre- 
sented such an utter contrast, that she seemed infinitely uglier to 
me than the cold-blooded, cadaverous looking gambler I had seen 
lose his money a few hours before. While I was mentally com- 
paring them, in he came, limping towards the table. I was half 
tempted to peep round and see if he had not a cloven foot. With 
the same marble-like features and forbidding aspect he approach- 
ed and laid down a roll of twenty Napoleons. He won, and putting 
down another, won again ; and thus he continued, winning one 
after another, till he had got back the ten rolls he had lost before, 
and two in addition. Then, without waiting for fortune to turn 
against him, he walked away, not having spoken a word. 

Turning to a bath-house, I threw myself into the steaming 
water for an hour, and then retired to my couch. These baths 
are so large one can swim around in them, and are arranged in a 



CURIOUS MODE OF BATHING. 105 

row, with only a high partition between them, so that you can 
hear every splash and groan of your neighbour in the next apart- 
ment. On one side of me was an old man, apparently, whose 
kicks, at long intervals, told me he was yet alive. Some two or 
three women were on the other side, whose laughter and rapid 
German kept up a constant Babel, while the steam came rolling 
up over where I lay like the smoke from a coal-pit. I do not 
know what idea these Germans have of delicacy, but this hearing 
your neighbours kicking and splashing around you, while the 
whole building is open the entire length overhead, would not be 
tolerated in my own country. 

It must be remembered that these gambling " hells" are not in 
out of the way places, but meet you as they would if placed in 
the public rooms of the hotels at Saratoga, and were patronized by 
the fashionables of both sexes from New York city. Methinks 
it is time another Luther had arisen to sweep away this chaff of 
Germany. 



106 THE NEIDER SELTERS. 



XX. 

SCHWALBACH AND SCHLANGENBAB. 



There are other mineral waters in Nassau besides those of 
Wiesbaden, and differing from them entirely in taste and temper- 
ature. Schwalbach contains several springs very much like the 
Congress, Pavilion and Iodine Springs of Sara;toga. One called 
the Weinbrunnen, from the fancied resemblance of the water to 
wine, reminds one very much of the sparkling water of the Pa- 
vilion Spring. The Stahlbrunnen and the Pauline in the same 
place, differ from each other only in the little different proportions 
in which iron and carbonic acid gas are found in them. It is but 
a day's ride from this to the famous Nieder Selters, the spring 
from which the well known and almost universally circulated 
Seltzer water is obtained. Sir Francis Head's description of this 
spring and the mode of obtaining the water is better than any I 
could give. Says he : " On approaching a large circular shed 
covered with a slated roof, supported by posts but open on all 
sides, I found the single brunnen or well from which this highly 
celebrated water is forwarded to almost every quarter of the globe 
— to India, the West Indies, the Mediterranean, Paris, London, 
and to almost every city in Germany. The hole, which was 
about five feet square, was bounded by a framework of four 
stronor beams mortised together, and the bottom of the shed beins: 
boarded, it resembled very much, both in shape and dimensions, 
one of the hatches in the deck of a si ip. A small crane with 
three arms, to each of which there was suspended a square ircn 
crate or basket a little smaller than the brunnen, stood about ten 
feet off; and while peasant girls, with a stone bottle (holding 
three pints) dangling on every finger of each hand, were rapidly 



MODE OF FILLING THE BOTTLES. 107 



filling two of these crates, which contained seventy bottles, a man 
turned the third by a winch, until it hung immediately over the 
brunnen, into which it then rapidly descended. The air in these 
seventy bottles being immediately displaced by the water, a great 
bubbling of course ensued, but in about twenty seconds this hav- 
ing subsided, the crate was raised ; and while seventy more 
bottles descended from another arm of the crane, a fresh set of 
girls curiously carried off these full bottles, one on each finger 
of each hand, ranging them in long rows upon a large table or 
dresser, also beneath the shed. No sooner were they there than 
two men, with surprising activity, put a cork into each ; while 
two drummers, with a long stick in each of their hands, hammer- 
ing them down, appeared as if they were playing upon musical 
glasses. Another set of young women now instantly carried 
them off, four and five in each hand, to men who, with sharp 
knives, sliced off the projecting part of the cork ; and this opera- 
tion being over, the poor jaded bottles were delivered over to 
women, each of whom actually covered three thousand of them a 
day with white leather, which they firmly bound with pack-thread 
round the corks ; and then, without placing the bottles on the 
ground, they delivered them over to a man seated beside them, 
who, without any apology, dipped each of their noses into boiling 
hot rosin, and before they had recovered from this unexpected 
operation, the Duke of Nassau's seal was stamped upon them by 
another man, when then they were hurried, sixteen and twenty at 
a time, by girls, to magazines, where they peacefully remained 
ready for exportation. 

" Having followed a set of bottles from the brunnen to the store 
where I left them resting from their labours, I strolled to another 
part of the establishment, where were empty bottles calmly wait- 
ing for their turn to be filled. I here counted twenty-five bins of 
bottles, each four yards broad, six yards deep, and eight feet high. 
A number of young girls were carrying thirty-four of them at a 
time to an immense reservoir, which was kept constantly full, by 
a large fountain pipe, of beautiful, clear fresh water." 

Speaking of the number of bottles that strew the. road in eveiy 
direction, and make the very place look as if it had been -once 
made of bottles and overthrown in a thunder storm, leaving its 



108 NUMBER OF BOTTLES EXPORTED. 

wreck on the ground, he says : " The little children really looked 
as if they were naade of bottles : some wore a pyramid of them in 
baskets on their heads ; — some of them were laden with tht m, 
hanging over their shoulders, before and behind ; — some carried 
them strapped round their middle, all their hands full ; and the 
little urchins that could scarcely walk, were advancing, each 
hugging in its arms one single bottle ! In fact, at Nieder Selters 
* an infant ' means a being totally unable to carry a bottle ; pu- 
berty and manhood are proved by bottles ; a strong man brags of 
the number he can carry, and superannuation means being no 
longer able in this world to bear bottles. 

" The road to the brunnen is actually strewed with fragments, 
and so are the ditches ; and when the reader is informed that, be- 
sides all he has so patiently heard, bottles are not only expended, 
filled and exported, but actually made at Nieder Selters, he must 
admit that no writer can do justice to that place unless every line 
of his description contains at least once the word — hotile. The 
moralists of Nieder Selters preach on bottles. Life, they say, ia 
a sound bottle, and death a cracked one. Thoughtless men are 
empty bottles ; drunken men are leaky ones ; and a man highly 
educated, fit to appear in any country and any society, is of 
course, a bottle corked, rosined, and stamped with the seal of the 
Duke of Nassau." 

This humorous and graphic description will not be thought 
much exaggerated when we remember that nearly a million and 
a half of bottles are annually carried out of that small inland 
German town, to say nothing of another million and a half bro- 
ken there. In the year 1832 there were exported from that 
spring 1,295,183 bottles. If they were all quart bottles, it would 
amount to over a thousand barrels of mineral water, which annu 
ally goes down somebodies' throats. This valuable spring was 
originally bought by the ancestor of the Duke for a single butt of 
wine, and it now yields a nett profit of over $26,000 per annum. 

Schlangenbad, or the Serpent's bath, is another of the brunnens 
of Nassau. Schlangenbad is in a secluded spot, and takes its 
name from the quantity of snakes that live about it, swimming 
around in the spring and crawling through the houses with the ut- 
most liberty. The wa'.ers are celebrated for their effect on the 



LEGEND OF THE SERPENT'S BATH. 109 

skin, reducing it almost to marble whiteness. The most invete- 
rate wrinkles and the roughest skin become smooth and white 
under the wonderful effects of this water. Acting as a sort of 
corrosive, it literally scours a man white, and then soaks him soft 
and smooth. Says Francis Head, " I one day happened to over- 
hear a fat Frenchman say to his friend, after he had been lying 
in one of these baths a half an hour : * Monsieur, dans ces hams 
ou devient ahsolument amour eux de soi meme.' ' Sir, in these 
baths, one absolutely becomes enamoured of himself.' " So 
great is the effect of this water on the skin, that it is bottled and 
sent to the most distant parts of Europe as a cosmetic. 

The Germans have some mysterious origin to every thing, and 
what the Italians refer to the Madonna, they attribute to some in- 
definite mysterious agency. This spring, they say, was discov- 
ered by a sick heifer. Having been wasting away a long time, 
till her bones seemed actually to be pushing through her skin, and 
she was given up by the herdsman to die ; she all at once disap- 
peared and was gone for several weeks. No one thought of her, 
as it was supposed she was dead, but one day she unexpectedly 
returned, a sleek, fat, bright-eyed and nimble heifer. Every 
evening, however, she disappeared, which excited the curiosity of 
the herdsman so tliat he at length followed her, when to his sur- 
prise he saw her approach this spring, then unknown, from which 
having drank, she quietly returned. Not long after, a beautiful 
young lady began to waste away precisely like the heifer, and 
all medicines and nursing were in vain, and she was given over 
to die. 

The herdsman who had seen the wonderful cure performed on 
one of his herd being told of her sickness, went to her and besought 
her to try the spring. Like a sensible man, he thought what was 
good for the heifer was good for the woman. She consented to 
try the remedy, and in a few weeks was one of the freshest, fat- 
test, plumpest young women in all the country round. From that 
moment, of course, the fame of the spring was secured, and it has 
gone on increasing in reputation, till now the secluded spot is vis- 
ited by persons from every part of Europe. 

The duchy of Nassau is a beautiful portion of Germany, and 

17 



110 DESPOTISM OF THE DUKE OF NASSAU. 

if the Duke would only abrogate, like a sensible man, some of his 
foolish tyrannical feudal laws, and become a father to his subjects, 
it would be a delightful spot every way. But the petty prince of 
every petty province seems to think he is more like a king the 
"e despotic he behaves. 



MAYENCE. Ill 



i XXI. 

1 MAYENCE-THE RHINE 



Mayence or Mainz lies at the upper termination of the fine 
scenery of the Rhine. From this to Coblenz, nearly sixty miles, 
this river is lined with towns, and convents, and castles, as rich 
in association as the ruins around Rome. 

Mayence has its sights for the traveller, among which are the 
cathedral, the ruins of an old Roman structure, a museum of 
paintings, several monuments, &c., which I will pass over. 
There are two things worth recording of Mayence. It was here 
the famous Hanseatic League (the result of the Rhenish League) 
was formed by a confederation of cities. It was the first eftec- 
tual blow aimed against unjust restrictions on commerce. Rob- 
ber chieftains had lined the Rhine from Cologne to Mayence v%^ith 
castles, which frowned down on the river that washed their foun- 
dations ; and levied tribute on every passing vessel. In the mid- 
dle ages there were thirty-two '• toll-gates" of these bold highway- 
men on the river. Now the only chieftain on the Rhine who is 
still allowed to hold and exercise his feudal right, is the Duke of 
Nassau. Under this strong confederation, the haughty castles 
one after another went down, and there is now scarcely a ruin 
that does not bear the mark of the Emperor Rudolph's stroke. 
Commerce was freed from the heavy exactions that weighed it 
down, and sailed with spreading canvass and fearless prow under 
the gloomy shadows of the towers that had once been its terror 
and destroyer. 

Bvron looked on these castles with the eye of a poet, and felt 
vastly more sympathy for the robber chieftains that lived by vio- 
lence, than for the peaceful traders whose bodies were often left 



112 THE CHIEFS OF THE RHINE. 

floating down the Rhine. It is well for the world that those who 
Ibrmed the Hanseatic League were not poets of the Lara, Childe 
Harold, and Manfred school. Seeing very little romance in hav- 
ing their peaceful inhabitants fired upon by robbers who were 
fortunate enough to live in castles, they wisely concluded to put 
a stop to it. Had they not taken this practical view of the mat- 
ter, Byron would probably not have been allowed to poetise so 
much at his leisure and with such freedom of expression, as he did 
■when he sung of the -chiefless castles breathing stern farewells." 

" And there they stand as stands a lofty mind. 

Worn but unstoopiug to the baser crowd, 

All teuantless save to the crannying wind, 

Or holding dark communion with the cloud. 

There was a day when they were young and proud. 

Banners on high and battles passed below ; 

But they who fought are in a bloody shroud. 

And those which waved are shredless dust ere now. 
And the bleak battlements shall bear no future blow. 

Beneath those battlements, within those walls. 
Power dwelt amidst her passions ; in proud state 
Each robber chief upheld his armed halls. 
Doing his evil will, nor less elate 
Tlian mightier heroes of a longer date. 
What want these outlaw conquerors should have. 
But history's purchased page to call them great ? 
A wider space an ornamented grave, 
Their hopes were not less warm, their souls were full as bravtf 

In their baronial feuds and single fields 
What deeds of prowess unrecorded died? 
And Love, which lent a blazon to their shields, 
With emblems well devised by amorous pride. 
Through all the mail of iron hearts would glide ; 
But still their flame was fierceness, and drew on 
Keen contest and destruction near allied, 
And many a tower for some fair mischief won. 
Saw the discoloured Rhine, beneath its ruin run. 

But thou, exulting and abounding river ! 
Making thy waves a blessing as they flow 



THE FIRST PRINTING PRESS. IIJ 

Througii banks whose beauty would endure forever 
Could man but leave thy bright creations so, 
Nor its fair promise from the surface mow 
With the sharp scythe of conflict, — then to see 
Thy valley of sweet waters, were to know 
Earth proved like Heaven ; and to seem such to me, 
Even now what wants thy stream ? — that it should Lethe be. 

A thousand battles have assailed thy banks, 
But these and half their fame have passed away. 
And Slaughter heaped on high his welt'riug ranks, 
Their very graves are gone, and what are they ? 
Thy tide washed down the blood of yesterday : 
And all was stainless, and on thy clear stream 
Glossed with its dancing light the sunny ray. 
But o'er the blackened memory's blighting dream 
Thy waves would vainly roll, all sweeping as they seem." 

Thus mused the haughty misanthropic bard along the Rhine ;— 
and these few sentences, by the conflicting sentiments that per- 
vade them, exhibit the perfect chaos of principle and feeling amid 
which he struggled with more desperation than wisdom. One 
moment he expresses regret that those old feudal chiefs have 
passed away, declaring, on the faith of a bard, that they were as 
good as their destroyers, and the next moment pours his note of 
lamentation over the evils of war. 

The other notable event in the history of Mayence is — the first 
printing press was established here. 

There is a monument here to Gensfleisch [goose jiesli), called 
Gutemberg, a native of the place, who was the inventor of move- 
able types. This first printing officej occupied by him between 
the years 1443 and 1450, is still standing. One could moralize 
over it an hour. From the first slow arrangement of those move- 
able types to the present diffusion of printed matter, what a long 
stride ! He who could hear the first crippled movement of that min- 
iature press, the only one whose faint sound rose from this round 
earth; and then catch the din and thunder of the "ten thousand 
times ten thousand" steam presses«^hat are shaking the very con- 
tinents on which they rest, with their fierce action; would see an 
onward step in the progress of the race more prophetic of change 

9 



114 BRIDGE OF BOATS. 

than in the conquests of the Csesars. The quiet, thoughtful Gens- 
fleisch little knew what an earthquake he was generating as he 
slowly distributed those few types. If the sudden light which 
rushed on the world had burst on his vision, and the shaking of 
empires and sound of armies, set in motion by the diffusion of 
thougnts and truths which the press had scattered on its lightning- 
ike pinions, met his ear, he would have been alarmed at his la- 
uour, and trembled as he held the first printed leaf in his hand. 
That printed page was a richer token to the desponding world 
than the olive leaf which the dove bore back to the Ark from the 
subsiding deluge. Men, as they roam by the Rhine, talk of old 
Schomberg and Blucher and Ney, and heroes of martial renown, 
but John Gensfleisch and Martin Luther are the two mightiest 
men that lie along its shores. The armies that struggled here, are 
still, and their renowned battle-fields have returned again to the 
hand of the husbandman ; but the struggle commenced by these 
men has not yet reached its height, and the armies they marshall- 
ed not yet counted their numbers, or fought their greatest battle. 

Well, brave Gutemberg, (to descend from great things to small) 
I here, on thy own moveable types, lay my offering to thee, and 
salute thee "greater than a king." 

A bridge of boats, one thousand six hundred and sixty -six feet 
long, here crosses the Rhine to Cassel, the railroad depot for 
Frankfort and Wiesbaden. It is strongly fortified, and commands 
the bridge in a manner that would make the passage of it by a 
hostile army, like the passage of the bridge of Lodi. The boats 
which form it lie with their heads up stream, secured to the bed 
of the river by strong fastenings ; and covered with planks. Sec- 
tions here and there swing back to admit the free passage of boats, 
while nearly half of the whole line is compelled to retire before 
me of those immense rafts 9f timber which are floated down the 
Rhine. 



ASSOCIATIONS OF THE RHINE. 115 



XXII. 
THE CASTELLATED EHINE 



" The Rhine ! the Rhine !" which has been the shout of glad 
armies, as its silver sheen flashed on their eyes as they came 
over the surrounding heights, is interesting more from its associa- 
tion than its scenery. The changes that have come over the 
world are illustrated more strikingly here than even in Rome. 
The old convent where the jolly friar revelled, is converted into 
a manufactory — the steamboat is rushing past the nodding castles 
of feudal chiefs — the modern town straggling through the ruins 
of once lordly cities, and all the motion and excitement of the 
nineteenth century, over the unburied corpses of the first fourteen 
centuries. There is probably no river on our globe more rich 
in associations than the Rhine. Navigable for over six hundred 
miles, through the very heart of Europe, its dominion has been 
battled for for nineteen centuries. From the time the Roman 
legions trod its shores, and shouted victory in good classic Latinj 
or retired before the fierce charge of barbaric warriors ; to the 
middle ages, when feudal chiefs reared their castles here, and 
performed deeds of daring and chivalry that dimly live in old 
traditions ; it has been the field of great exploits, and witnessed the 
most important event of European history. It has been no less the 
scene of stirring events in modern times. The French Revolu- 
tion, after it had reduced France to chaos, rolled heavily towards 
the Rhine. On its banks was the first great struggle between the 
young and strong Democracy, and the haughty, but no longer 
vigorous Feudalism. Here kingship first trembled for its crown 
and throne, and Europe gathered in haste to save its tottering 
monarchies. On its shores France stood and shouted to the 



116 SCENERY OF THE RHINE. 

nations beyond, sending over the startled waters the cry, " All 
men are born free and equal," till the murmur of the people 
answered it. The Rhine has seen the armies of the Caesars along 
its banks — the castles of feudal chiefs flinging their shadows over 
its placid bosom — the printing press rise in its majesty beside it, 
and the stern Luther tread along its margin muttering wo;-ds that 
Bhook the world. It has also borne Bonaparte and his strong 
legions on, yet amid it all — amid crumbling empires, and through 
the smoke of battle — undisturbed by the violence and change tliat 
have ploughed up its banks, lined them with kingdoms, and 
strewed them with their ruins — it has ever rolled, the same quiet 
current, to the sea. Its scenery is also beautiful, but not so much 
when viewed from its surface as when seen from the different 
points of prospect furnished by the heights around. From the 
old castles on the shores and the ridges beyond, the landscape has 
almost endless variations, yet is always beautiful. 

Byron has combined all the striking features of the Rhine in 
a single verse, yet coloured some of them a little too highly. 

" The negligently grand, the fruitful bloom, 

Of coming ripeness, the white city's sheen. 

The rolling stream, the precipice's gloom, 

The forest's growth, and Gothic walls between. 

The wild rocks shaped as they had turrets been 

In mockery of man's art ; and these withal 

A race of faces happy as the scene, 

Whose fertile bounties here extend to all, 
Still springing o'er thy banks, though empires near them fall." 

Almost every castle has, with its real history, some wild tradi- 
tion connected; which, though it may or may not be true, adds 
great interest to the mysterious ruin. In looking over the guide 
book I was struck with the number of " outline sketches'' for 
magazine tales — thrilling novels, &c., furnished on almost every 
page. In a few sentences will be told the fate of some old feudal 
lord, or his beautiful daughter, of whose private history one would 
gladly know more. Thus at Braesemberg are the ruins of two 
castles, of one of which, the Bronnserhof, we are told that " tra- 
dition says, that one of these knights, Bonser of Rudesheim, on 



TRADITION OF BRAESEMBERG. 117 

repairing to Palestine, signalized himself by destroying a dragon, 
which was the terror of the Christian army. No sooner had ho 
accomplished it, than he was taken prisoner by the Saracens ; and 
while languishing in captivity, he made a vow, that if ever he 
returned to his castle of Rudesheim, he would devote his only 
da'ighter, Gisela, to the church. He arrived at length, a pilgrim, 
at his castle, and was met by his daughter, now grown into a 
lovely woman. Gisela loved, and was beloved by a young knight 
from a neighbouring castle, and she heard with consternation her 
father's vow. Her tears and entreaties could not change his 
purpose. He threatened her with his curse if she did not obey ; 
and in the midst of a violent storm, she precipitated herself from 
the tower of the castle into the Rhine below. The fishermen 
found her corpse the next day in the river, by the tower of Hatto, 
and the boatmen and vintagers at this day fancy they sometimes 
see the pale form of Gisela hovering about the ruined tower, and 
hear her voice mingling its lamentations with the mournful whis- 
tlings of the wind." I leave to some one else the filling up this 
outline. There is the scene of the first interview of this selfish 
old Jephtha with his daughter — the wild meetings of the two 
lovers — the pleadings with the father — the rash purposes, and the 
final leap from the castle tower, of the beautiful Gisela — all fair 
property for the weaver of romances — a sort of schedule already 
made out for him. 

This tower of Hatto, at the base of which was found the form 
of Gisela, is some distance farther dov/n the river. In descending 
to it one passes the vineyards of the famed Rudesheim wine, and 
the white castle of St. Roch. The Bishop of Hatto has been im- 
mortalized by Southey, in his '•' Traditions of Bishop Hatto,'' com- 
mencing with the imaginative line 

" The summer and autumn had been so wet." 

Here begins the " Rhine gorge," which furnishes the most beau- 
tiful scenery on the river. The banks of the stream become more 
preciphous and rocky, affording secure frontiers for the feuda. 
chiefs that fortified themselves upon them. Ruined castles — gaping 
towers — dilapidated fortresses, begin to crowd with almost start- 
ling rapidity on the beholder. As the boat flies ^long on the swift 



lis CASTLES OF THE RHIXE. 

current of the stream he has scarcely thne to read the history and 
traditions of one, before another claims his attention. Placed ia 
every variety of position, and presenting memorials of almost eve- 
ry century, they keep the imagination in constant activity. Tlie 
castles of Falkenburg perched on its rocky eminence ; Reichenstein 
and Rheinstein, a little lower down, are grouped together in one 
coiq: d'cEil, while the falling turrets of Sonneck rush to meet you 
from below, and the castle of Heimberg frowns over the village at 
its feet. Next comes old Furstenberg with its round tower and 
crumbling walls, and then Nottingen, and after it the massive 
fragments of Stahleck castle, looking gloomily down from the 
heights of Bacharach. "While I was thus casting my eyes, first 
on one side, and then the other, of the river, as these, to me new 
and strange objects, came and went on my vision, suddenly from 
out the centre of the river rose the castle of Pfalz. We had 
scarcely passed it before the batt ements of Gutenfels appeared, 
and soon after the rock-founded castle of Schaenberg. Tradition 
says that it received the name of Beautiful Hill from seven beau- 
tiful daughters of one of the old chieftains. Though beloved and 
sought for by all the young knights far and near, they turned a 
deaf ear to every suitor, and finally, for their hardheartedness, 
were turned into seven rocks, which still remain, a solemn warn- 
ing to all beautiful and heartless coquets to remotest time. At 
length, just above St. Goar, the black and naked precipice of Lur- 
leiberg rose out of the water on the left, frowning in savage si- 
lence over the river. Just before we came opposite this perpen- 
dicular rock, the boat entered a rapid, formed by the immense 
rocks in the bed of the stream, and began to shoot downward like 
an arrow to an immense whirlpool in front of the Lurleiberg. 
The river here striking the rocks, and dashing back towards the 
opposite side, forms a whirlpool, called by the inhabitants the 
Gewirr; into the furious eddy of which our little steamboat dashed 
without fear. She careened a little one side as she passed along 
the slope of the Wirbel, probably tipped over by the beautiful, 
thoujrh evil-minded, water nymph — the Circe of the Rhine — who 
used to beguile poor ignorant boatmen by her ravishing voice into 
the boiling eddies, where she deliberately drowned them. Unable 
to charm the steam-engine, which goes snorting in the most unpo- 



SINGULAR ECHO. 119 



etical and daring manner' through all the meshes she weaves with 
her whirlpool, she revenges herself by putting her ivory shoulder 
against the keel of the boat as it passes, and exerting all her 
strength gives it a slight tip over, just to show that she still occupies 
her realm. 

I was struck here with one of those exhibitions of the love of 
the picturesque and beautiful which meets the traveller at almost 
every step on the Continent. There is a grotto under the Lurlei- 
berg where the echo of a bugle blast or pistol shot is said to be 
repeated fifteen times. As we approached it, I heard first the ex- 
plosion of a gun, and then the strains of a bugle. I did not know 
"at first what it meant, and was much amused when I was told, on 
inquiring, that a man was kept stationed there, whose sole busi- 
ness was to fire guns and blow his bugle for the benefit of travel- 
lers. This making a business of getting up echoes looks odd to 
an American. A man thus stationed on the Hudson to rouse 
echoes for every boat that passed, would have a great many jokes 
cracked at his expense. I should have been better pleased witn 
this arrangement, however, had I derived any benefit from it. Be- 
tween the crushing sound of the water, as it swept in swift circles 
around the boat, and the churning of the steam-engine, I did not 
get even a single echo. I heard only the explosion of the gun, 
and the fitful, uncertain strains of the bugle — the echoes the steam- 
boat and whirlpool had all to themselves. 

We had scarcely passed the base of this precipice before the 
ruins of the fortress of Rheinfels emerged into view. This is the 
largest ruin on the river, and witnessed bloody work in olden 
times, as its stern lord levied duties on every traveller up the 
Rhine. It was the impregnable character of this fortification 
which helped bring about the Hanseatic League. It was blown 
up by the revolutionary army of France, and has remained a 
ruin ever since. Next comes the Thurmberg, or castle of the 
mouse, a ruin in a more perfect state of preservation than any 
other on the Rhine. It wants only the wood-work to render it 
entire. A little lower down rises the old convent of Bornhofen, 
and the twin castles of Sternberg and Liebenstein, presenting a 
most singular, yet charming, feature in the landscape. Still 
farther down, and lo, the noble castle of Marksburg, perched on 



120 CASTLE OF STAL^ENFELS. 

the top of a cone-like rock, looking silently down on the little 
village of Branbach, at the base, burst on my sight. This old 
castle stands just as it did in the middle ages, with all its secret, 
narrow passages, winding staircases, dungeons, and instruments 
of torture, preserved through the slow lapse of centuries. The 
castle of Lahneck comes next, and last of all, before reaching 
Coblentz, the fine old castle of Stalzenfels. It stands on a rock in 
the most picturesque position imaginable. It had lain in ruins 
since the French destroyed it, nearly two hundred years ago ; 
but the town of Coblentz having presented it to the Crown Prince 
of Prussia, he is slowly repairing it after the ancient model. He 
devotes an annual sum to the repairs, and it already shows what 
a beautiful structure it must have been originally. The gift on 
the part of Coblentz was no great affair, as they had already 
offered it for fifty-three dollars, and could find nobody to buy it at 
that price. The old castles on the Rhine follow the laws of trade 
— the price always corresponds to the demand. But here the 
castle-market is glutted, and hence the sales are light. 

One cannot easily imagine the effect of these turreted ruins, 
suddenly bursting on one at every turn of the river. The whole 
distance from Mayence to Coblentz is less than sixty miles, and 
yet one passes all these old castles in sailing over it. But these 
castles are not all that charm the beholder. There are ruined 
convents and churches — smiling villages, sweet vineyards — bare 
precipices and garden-like shores, all coming and going like the 
objects in a moving diorama, keeping up a succession of sur- 
prises that prevents one effectually from calling up the associa- 
tions of any one particular scene. 



BONAPARTE AND THE RUSSIANS. 121 



XXIII. 

TPIE RHINE FROM COBLENTZ TO COLOGNE. 



CoBLENTz is one of the most picturesque towns I have ever 
seen. Its position on the Rhine seems chosen on purpose for 
effect. One of the most interesting objects in it is the rock and 
fortress of Ehrenbreitstein, which commands a glorious view of 
the junction of the Rhine and Mosel, and which, from its impreg- 
nable position, is called the Gibraltar of the Rhine. It will hold 
a garrison of 14,000 men, while the magazines will contain pro- 
visions sufficient to maintain eight thousand men for ten years. 
The escarped rocks on three sides would repel almost any assault, 
and the fortress can easily sustain the glorious name it gained in the 
seventeenth century, when assailed in vain by the French armies. 
The nam.e signifies " honour's broadstone." There is a convent 
of Jesuits in the town, with such ample wine cellars that a stage 
coach could drive around in them, and which have held nearly a 
half a million of bottles of wine. In the public square is a foun- 
tain, erected as a monument, by the French, in 1812, on which 
was chiselled an inscription, to commemorate their invasion of 
Russia. A few months after, the fragments of the Grand Army 
were driven over the Rhine. Over the fallen host the Russians 
had marched in triumph, and pressing fast on the flying traces of 
Bonaparte, entered this town on their march for Paris. The 
Russian commander seeing this monument, instead of having it 
destroyed, caused to be cut under the French inscription, " Vu et 
approuve par nous, commandant Russe, de la ville CoMence, Jan- 
vier V^, 1814. This is rather a hard hit on the French, and 
shows that St. Priest had more contempt than hate in his compo- 
sition. Here, too, sleeps the brave and noble Marceau, who fell 



GRAVE OF MARGE AU. 



in the hotly fought battle of Altenkirchen. Byron expressed the 
feelings of both friends and foes when he sung 

*' Brief, brave and glorious was his young career — 

His mourners were two liosts, his friends and foea ; 

And fitly may the stranger lingering here 

Pray for his gallant spirit's bright repose, 

For he was Freedom's champion, one of those, 

The few in number, who had not o'erstept 

The charter to chastise which she bestows 

On such as wield her weapons ; he had kept 
The whiteness of his soul, and thus men o'er him wept." 

We had scarcely shoved away from the wharf at Coblentz 
before castles, which seemed to have dropped down the river 
during our stop, began to rise along the shores. The Crane, 
built nearly three hundred years ago, and just below it the Watch 
Tower of older date, round below and eight-sided above, present 
a most picturesque appearance. Farther down rises the castle 
of Rheineck, with the castellated building beside it looking like 
the residence of some old feudal chief, in the heyday of his pow- 
er. Farther down still, after the Ahr has poured its silver stream 
into the Rhine, appear the black precipices of Erpeler Lei, seven ' 
hundred feet high. At first view this immense basaltic rock 
seems perfectly inaccessible, but the vintager has converted it 
into a vineyard. In the crevices, all along the face of the preci- 
pice, are placed baskets filled with earth, in which are planted 
vines, that creep up and cling to the rock, covering it with ver- 
dure and fruit. Opposite the village of Unkel is another basaltic 
rock, rising in columns from the water. The Rhine raves past it 
as if conscious that the long, dull sweep of the Lowlands was be- 
low, and it must foam and rave while it could. 

The Tower of Roland comes next, and after it the ruins of 
seven castles, on seven different mountains, the remains of the 
seats of the Archbishops of Cologne. A little farther on, and 
lo, the Rhine goes in one broad sweep of twenty miles to Cologne, 
sparkling under the summer sky, and rejoicing in the wealth of 
villages and vineyards, and cultivated fields along its shores. 
The view here is glorious, and I was tempted to echo the shout of 
the Prussian army, " The Rhine ! The Rhine !" Up the river 



THE SEVEN HILLS. 123 



the rocks shut in the prospect, as if endeavouring to restrain the 
stream, and look savage and gloomy upon the liberated waters 
that leap away without farther restraint, for the open country 
below. Unlike the Hudson, which goes in one broad steady 
sweep from Albany to New York, the Rhine is tortuous and un- 
steady ; now spreading out into a lake filled with islands, now 
smoothly laving the richly cultivated banks, and now dashing on 
the rocks that push into its channel, till its vexed waters boil in 
frenzy — and now gliding arrow-like past some old castle, that 
seems watching its movements. The natural scenery along its 
course is greatly inferior to that of the Hudson, but the accesso- 
ries of vineyards, and villages, and convents, and churches, and 
castles, and towers; and the associations around them all; make the 
passage up or down it one of the most interesting in the world, 
in the beauty and variety it presents. 

The seven hills, " Siehengehirge/' I mentioned above, are the 
lower terminations of the grand scenery on the Rhine. These 
" seven hills '^ (there are more than seven), crowned with their 
ruined castles, form a scene that can scarcely be surpassed. 
They have all been thrown up by some volcano, that lived, and 
worked, and died here, before man had a written history ; and^ 
rise in magnificent proportions along the banks of the rushing 
river. The Lowenberg, 1414 feet high ; the Wolkenberg, 1067 ; 
the Drachenfels (dragon's rock), 1056 ; the Oelberg, 1473 ; the 
Niederstromberg, 1066 ; and the Stromberg, 1053 feet in height, 
surmounted by ruined battlements, towers, &c., are a glorious 
brotherhood, and worthy of the Rhine, on which they look. I 
will not give the traditions connected with many of these, nor 
add the particular descriptions and aspect of each. The impres- 
sion they make on one he carries with him through life. Espe- 
cially does an American, whose eye has roamed over primeval 
forests, broad rivers, and lofty mountains ; left just as the hand of 
nature formed them, gaze with curious feelings on this blending 
of precipices, and castles, and mountains, and ruins, together. 
Nature looks old in such connection — a sort of bondslave to man, 
bereft of her pride and freedom, and robbed of her freshness and 
life. 

Drachenfels rises almost perpendicularly to the vie\\' from the 



124 DRACHENFELS. 



river shore, with a cap of ruias on its lofty head. Byron has im- 
mortalized this rock in language so sweet that I risk the complaint 
of quoting too much, and give the three following beautiful verses. 

The castled crag of Drachenfels 
Frown o'er the wide and winding Rhinei 
Whose breast of w^aters broadly swells 
Between the banks which bear the vine, 
And hills all rich with blossom'd treeS; 
And fields which promise corn and wine, 
And scattered cities crowning these, 
Whose far white walls along them shine, 
Have strewed a scene which I could see 
With double joy wert thou with me. 

And peasant girls with deep blue eyes, 

And hands which offer early flowers, 

Walk smiling o'er this paradise ; 

Above, the frequent feudal towers 

Through green leaves lift their walls of grey. 

And many a rock which steeply towers, 

And noble arch in proud decay. 

Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers ; 

But one thing want these banks of Rhine, — 

Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine ! 

The river nobly foams and flows. 

The charm of this enchanted ground, 

And all its thousand turns disclose 

Some fresher beauty varj'ing round. 

The haughtiest breast its wish might bound 

Through life to dwell delighted here ; 

Nor could on earth a spot be found 

To nature and to me so dear. 

Could thy dear eyes in following mine 

Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine." 

Passing Bonn, with its University, Cathedral, &c., rapidly aa 
steam and the downward current together could bear us, we were 
soon under the white walls of Cologne, Here I lost sight of 
two fellow travellers that had added much to my pleasure 
down the Rhine. It had so happened that we wished to stop ai 
the same places, and had thus kept company from Frankfort to 



FRENCH LADIES. 123 



Cologne. They were two ladies that had attracted my attention 
when they got on board at Mayence. One was an elderly hAy, 
and the other young and beautiful. 

Sitting near them soon after we started, the elderly lady ad- 
dressed some inquiry to me respecting the boat, which I answered 
in the fewest words possible, for I perceived they were Frencli, 
and I was nervous about speaking to them in their own language. 

As the day advanced I was struck with the familiarity exhib- 
ited by the passengers. A gentleman would address a lady be- 
side him, a perfect stranger, with some remark about the scenery, 
which she answered with the utmost cheerfulness, and there was 
a general freedom from restraint, and a confidence in each other's 
polite behaviour, the reverse of which makes our steamboat trav- 
elling like an assemblage of pickpockets, unacquainted with each 
other, and suspicious of each other's designs. 

Seeing, not long after, a copy of one of Dickens's works in the 
younger lady's hand, I presumed to address her in English, which, 
to my delight, she spoke almost like an Englishwoman. There 
was an ease and grace in her manner, and her remarks were char- 
acterized by an intelligence and a knowledge of the world, that 
rendered her one of the most attractive persons I ever met. She 
was glad, she said, to converse in English, and I was glad to 
have her. I was a stranger and alone, and hence felt more deeply 
her kindness in thus conversing with me hour after hour. An 
American lady might think this vastly improper and forward, but 
/ shall remember her with grateful feelings as long as I remem- 
ber the Rhine. 

She, with the elderly lady her companion, were to ascf»ad the 
river in their carriage, which they took aboard at Cologne; so as 
to get all the beauties of the scenery. 



J^6 COLOGNE CATHEDRAL. 



xxiy. 

^fflNE WINES, COLOGNE CATHEDRAL, LOU- 
VAIN, BRUSSELS. 



I HAD designed to give a chapter on Rhine wines, and the vine- 
yards of the Rhine, but will pass them over, referring only to 
Prince Metternich's celebrated vineyard, just above Geissenheim, 
between Mayence and Coblentz. The monks formerly possessed 
this extensive vineyard, covering iifty-five acres. The Prince of 
Orange o^\ned it next, and held it till it fell into Bonaparte's 
hand, who gave it to Marshal Kellerman, in reward for his ser- 
vices. At the close of Napoleon's career, it reverted to the Em- 
peror of Austria, who made a present of it to Metternich, the pres- 
ent owner. He has repaired it, and the Chateau of Johannesberg 
is now a very conspicuous object on the banks of the Rhine. The 
vineyard yields about forty butts of wine per annum, and it is 
called the best of the Rhenish wines. 

Cologne, independent of its sights, is an object of interest, from 
yhe part it played in Roman history. A camp pitched here by 
Marcus Agrippa, was the first commencement of the city. Vitelli- 
us and Sylvanus were proclaim.ed emperors of Rome here, and 
here also Agrippina, the mother of Nero, was born. It retains, 
tD this day, many of the peculiar customs of Italy, and is the only 
city in the north of Europe where the Carnival is celebrated. I 
will not speak of the paintings it contains, or of the architecture of 
the churches. The Cathedral, however, I will mention in passing. 
This magnificent building was begun six hundred years ago, and 
still remains not half completed. It is of Gothic architecture, and 
had it been completed, would have been one of the finest edifices in 
the world. It was to have two towers, each five hundred feet, but 



DESCRIPTION OF THE CHOIR. 127 

they remain unfinished, and probably will to the end of time. 
The two things that interested me most were, the " Shrine of the 
three Kings of Cologne," and the Choir. The former is in a 
small chapel just behind the main altar, and is said to contain the 
hones of the three Magi who came from the East to lay their offer- 
ings at the feet of the infant Saviour, The names of these three 
wise men, the chronicle states, were Gaspar, Melchior, and Bal- 
thaser; and, to prevent the possibility of a doubt, their names are 
written in rubies on their own skulls. This shrine, with its gold 
and silver and precious stones, is said to be worth over a million 
of dollars, although bereft of some of its choicest gems during the 
French Revolution. 

The choir is the only part of the church completely finished, 
and shows by its magnificence and splendour the extravagant de- 
signs of the first builders. I have never seen any thing more 
grand in its general plan and construction, and yet so exquisitely 
beautiful in its details, than this choir. I cannot give a better de- 
scription of it than in the language of an English traveller. " The 
choir is the only part finished ; one hundred and eighty feet high^ 
and internally, from its size, height, and disposition of pillars, 
arches, chapels, and beautifully coloured windows, resembling a 
splendid vision. Externally, its double range of stupendous flying 
buttresses, and intervening piers, bristling with a forest of purflled 
pinnacles, strike the beholder with awe and astonishment." Long 
before reaching Cologne, the highest tower of the church is visible, 
with a huge crane swinging from its unfinished top, where it has 
hung for centuries. Some time since it was taken down by the 
city authorities, but a terrible thunder-storm which swept over 
the place soon after, was believed by the frightened inhabitants to 
ibe in consequence of their wickedness in removing this crane. It 
was saying to the world, " we never intend to finish this church;" 
a declaration which set the elements in such commotion, that soon 
after an awful black thunder-cloud began to show itself over the 
trembling city. The lightning crossed its fiery lances over head, 
and the redoubled thunder shook the very foundations on v/hich 
the city stood. As soon, therefore, as it was over, and to prevent 
another similar, more awful visitation, the inhabitants began to 
hoist this enormous c -ane to its place on the top of the tower. I 



123 BONES OF ELEVEN THOUSAND VIRGINS. 

could not but laugh, as I saw its black outline against the sky, at 
the folly that had replaced it there. It was the most deliberate 
humbug practised on a large scale I had ever seen. It was like 
the Irishman vowing a hundred candles to the Virgin Mary, if she 
would save him from shipwreck, when the vessel was breaking to 
pieces under him. Said his companion to him, " Why do you lie, 
for you know you can't get them ?'' " Never mind," he replied, 
'• keep still, the Virgin don't know it." The Cologne people have 
acted like the Irishman in this respect — they have no idea of fin- 
ishing the church, though a hundred thunder-storms should sweep 
over the city; but they seem to think that if the crane is up ready 
for hoisting stone, the Deity will not know it. If they only look 
grave, say nothing, and keep the crane swinging, they imagine 
the blessed Virgin will believe they design to commence building 
soon. 

Cologne is not so dirty as Coleridge makes it out to be, though 
it is a very disagreeable town to get around in. I will mention 
but one thing more in it — the Church of St. Ursula. It stands 
just without the walls, and is remarkable only for containing the 
bones and skulls of eleven thousand virgins, all slain in one great 
massacre. This is a large allowance even for a Roman Catholic 
tradition, which does not generally stick at improbabilities. It 
seems this St. Ursula, of blessed memory, in carrying her un- 
usual quantity of virgins from Britain to Armorica,was driven by 
tempests up the Rhine to Cologne, where the Huns, in their bar- 
barian fury, slew them all, because they would not yield to their 
lusts. To say nothing of this singularly large fleet of virgins, it 
is very curious they should be driven, by a week or more of tem- 
pests, through the Lowlands, up the Rhine to Cologne, without 
having once got aground or sent high and dry ashore. I will 
not, however, dispute the legend, especially as I saw several ter- 
races of the bones themselves, or at least of verilahle bones, ranged 
round the church between the walls. The skull of St. Ursula, 
with a few select ones, probably belonging to her body-guard, 
have a separate apartment, called the Golden Chamber, and are 
encased in silver. But, seriously, I cannot divine what first in- 
duced this grand collection of skeletons, and their peculiar ar- 
rangement for public exhibition It looks as if some battle-fieM 



AN IGNORANT ENGLISHMAN. 129 

had been robbed of its slain in order to furnish this cabinet of hide 
ous relics. 

I went by rail-road from Cologne to Aix la Chapelle (forty- 
three miles), and stopping there only long enough to get break- 
fast, found no time to see the town. The rail-road is not yet 
finished from it to Liege, and travellers are compelled to go by 
diligence. The distance is about twenty-six miles ; and having 
an unconquerable dislike to diligence travelling, I determined to 
hire a carriage. An English gentleman, standing at the door as 
I was inquiring about the terms, &c., said he should like to take a 
carriage with me. I gladly accepted his proposal, and we started 
off in company. I mention this incident to illustrate an English- 
man's ignorance of the United States. I had heard some of our 
most distinguished writers, male and female, speak of it in their 
encounters with the English in their own country, but had never 
met any marked case of it myself. But this man, who spent 
every summer on the Continent, knew no more of the American 
Republic than an idiot. Among other things exhibiting his ig- 
norance; in reply to my statement that I was from New York, he 
said, " New York — let me see — does that belong to the Canadas 
yet ?" I told him I believed not ; that it was my impression it 
had been separated from it for some time. " Ah !" said he, and 
that ended his inquiries on that point. It was equal to the re- 
mark of an English literary lady once to one of my own distin- 
guished countrywomen. In speaking of the favourable features 
of the United States, she remarked very naively, that she should 
think the climate would be very cool in summer, from the wind 
Mowing over the Cordilleras mountains ! 

The view of Liege, from the heights, as we began to descend 
into the valley, was quite a novel one for the Continent. The 
long chimneys of the numerous manufactories reminded me of 
the activity and enterprise of my own land. I did not go over 
the town, but took the rail-road for Louvain, on my way to Brus- 
sels. I just gave one thought to Quintin Durward and the " Wild 
Boar of Ardennes," and we were away with the speed of the wind. 
I stopped at Louvain solely to visit the beautiful Gothic building 
of the Hotel de Ville. It is said to be the most beautiful Gothic 
edifice in the world. The whole exterior, in alnvDst every foot of 

10 



130 PARK OF BRUSSELS. 

it, is elaborately wrought. Bassi relievi cover it — many of them 
representing sins and their punishments. The stone of which it 
is composed is soft when first quarried, and hence is easily worked, 
but it hardens by exposure to the air. 

The next morning I started for Brussels. There is an airiness 
and cheerfulness about this city that pleased me exceedingly, and 
I should think a residence in it, for a part of the year, would be 
delightful. The impression I got of it, however, may be owing to 
the position of the hotel at which I stopped. Situated on an emi- 
nence near the park, the traveller may be in a few momenta 
strolling through beautiful grounds, thronged with promeuaders as 
gay as those of the Champs Elysee and the Tuilcries. 



WATERLOO. 13^ 



XXY. 
BATTLE-FIELD OF WATERLOO. 



The sky was darkly overcast, and not a breath of air disturbed 
the ominous hush of the atmosphere, which always precedes a 
rain, as we started for the greatest battle-field of Europe. My 
companions were an American, and an English cavalry captain, 
just returned from the Indies. We had previously been shown 
the house in which the ball was held the night before the battle. 
I could imagine the sudden check to the "sound of revelry," when 
over the exciting notes of the viol, came the dull booming of can- 
non, striking on the youthful heart "like a rising knell." 

" Ab ! then and there was hurrying to and fro, 
And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress, 
And cheeks all pale which but an hour ago 
Blxished at the praise of their own loveliness ; 
And sudden partings, such as press 
The life from out young hearts, and choking sighs 
Which ne'er might be repeated." 

We followed the route taken by Wellington and his suite from 
Brussels, and trotting through the forest of Soignies, which Byron, 
by poetical license, has called the forest of Ardennes ; came upon 
the little hamlet of Waterloo, situated a short distance from the 
field of battle. Our guide was a man who lived in the village at 
the time of the battle, and had been familiar with all its local- 
ities for years. 

I have trod many battle-fields of ancient and modern glory, but 
never one with the strange feelings with which I wandered over 
this, for here the ytar of Bonaparte set forever. To understand the 



132 NIGHT BEFORE THE BATTLE. 

description, imagine two slightly elevated semicircular ridges, or, 
as they might more properly be teimed, slopes, curving gently 
towards each other hke a parenthesis, and you have the position 
of the two armies. On the summit of one of these slopes was ar- 
rayed the French army, and on the other tlie English. The night 
of the 17th of June was dark and stormy. The rain fell in tor- 
rents, and the two armies lay down in the tall rye drenched and 
cold to wait the morning that was to decide the fate of Europe 
and of IS'apoleon. From the ball-room at Brussels many an of- 
tioer had been summoned in haste to the field, and shivering and 
wet, was compelled to pass the night in mud and rain in his ele- 
gant attire. The artilleiy had cut up the ground so that the mire 
was shoe deep, Avhilc the tall grain lay crushed and matted beneath 
the feet of the soldiers. The morning of the 18th opened with a 
drizzling rain, and the two armies, benumbed with cold and soak- 
ing w^et, rose from their damp beds to the contest. Eighty thou- 
sand French soldiers were seen moving in magnificent array on 
the crest of the ridge, as they took their several positions for the 
day. Upward of seventy thousand of the allied forces occu- 
pied the ridge or eminences opposite them. — formed mostly iiito 
squares. 

In a moment the battle was all before me. I could almost see 
Bonaparte as, after having disposed his forces, and flushed with 
hope, he gaily exclaimed to his suite, " now to breakfast," and 
galloped away. The shout of " Vive I'Empereur" that followed 
shook the very field on which they stood, and seemed ominous 
of disaster to the allied army. Two hundred and sixty-two can- 
non lined the ridge like a wall of death before the French, while 
vVellington had but one hundred and eighty-six to oppose them. 
At eleven the firing commenced, and immediately Jerome Bona- 
parte led a column of six thousand men down on Hougoumont, an 
old chateau which defended Wellington's right, and was good as 
a fort. Advancing in the face of the most desti uctive fire, that gal- 
lant column pushed up to the very walls of the chateau, and thrust 
their bayonets through the door. But it was all in vain ; and 
though the building was set on fire and consumed, and the roar- 
ing of the flames was mingled with the shrieks of the wounded 
that were perishing ir it +.he rage of the combatants onl) increas. 



COMMENCEMENT OF THE BATTLE. 133 

ed. The Coldstream Guards held the court-yard with invinci- 
ble obstinacy, and Jerome Bonaparte was compelled to retire, af- 
ter leaving 1,400 men in a little orchard beside the walls, where 
it does not seem so many men could be laid. In a short time the 
battle became general along the whole lines, and prodigies of 
valour were performed on every rod of the ensanguined field. 
The heavy French cavalry came thundering down on the steady 
English squares, that had already been wasted by the destructive 
artillery, and strove with almost superhuman energy to break them. 
Driven to desperation by their repeatedly foiled attempts, they at 
length stopped their horses and coolly walked them round ana 
round the squares, and wherever a man fell dashed in, in vain val- 
our. But when one of those rock-fast squares began to waver, 
Wellington threw himself into its centre, and it again became 
immoveable as a mountain. With their gallant chief in their 
keeping those brave British hearts could not yield. Whole col- 
umns went down like frost-work before the headlong charges of 
cavalry and infantry. In the centre the conflict at length be- 
came awful, for there the crisis of the battle was fixed. Welling- 
ton stood under a tree while the boughs were crashing with the 
cannon shot over head, and nearly his whole guard smitten down 
by his side, anxiously watching the progress of the fight. His 
brave squares, torn into fragments by bombs and ricochet shot, 
still refused to yield one foot of ground. Napoleon rode through 
his ranks, cheering on the exhausted columns of infantry and 
cavalry, that rent the heavens with the shout of " Vive VEmjpe- 
reur,^^ and dashed with unparalleled recklessness on the bayonets 
of the English. 

The hero of Wagram, and Borodino, and Austerlitz, and 
Marengo, and Jena, enraged at the stubborn obstinacy of the 
British, rages over the field, and is still sure of victory. Welling- 
ton, seeing that he cannot much longer sustain the desperate 
charges of the French battalions, wipes the sweat from his anx- 
ious forehead and exclaims, '• Oh, that Blucher or night would 
come." Thus from eleven till four did the battle rage with san- 
guinary ferocity, and still around the centre it grew more awful 
every moment. The mangled cavalry staggered up to the ex- 
hausted British squares, which, though diminished and bleediufj 

18 



134 ARRIVAL OF BLUCHER. 

in every part, seemed rooted to the ground they stood upon. The 
heroic Picton had fallen at the head of his brigade, while his sword 
was flashing over his head. Ponsonby had gone down on the 
hard fought field, and terror and slaughter were on every side. 
The nost enthusiastic courage had driven on the French troops, 
which the rock-fast resolution of British hearts alone could 
resist. The charge of the French cavalry on the centre was 
awful. Disregarding the close and murderous fire of the British 
batteries, they rode steadily forward till they came to the bayonet's 
point. Prodigies of valour were wrought, and heroes fell at 
every discharge. Bonaparte's star now blazed forth in its an- 
cient splendour, and now trembled in the zenith. The shadows 
of fugitive kings flitted through the smoke of battle, and thrones 
tottered on the ensanguined field. At length a dark object was 
seen to emerge from the distant wood; and soon an army of 30,000 
men deployed into the field, and began to march straight for the 
scene of conflict. Blucher and his Prussians came, but no 
Grouchy, who had been left to hold him in check, followed after. 
In a moment Napoleon saw that he could not sustain the charge 
of so many fresh troops, if once allowed to form a junction with 
the allied forces, and so he determined to stake his fate on one 
bold cast, and endeavour to pierce the allied centre with one grand 
charge of the Old Guard, and thus throw himself between the 
two armies, and fight them separately. For this purpose the 
Imperial Guard was called up, which had remained inactive 
during the whole day, and divided into two immense columns, 
which were to meet at the British centre. That under Reille 
no sooner entered the fire than it disappeared like frost-work. 
The other was placed under Ney, the " bravest of the brave," 
and the most irresistible of all Napoleon's Marshals. Napoleon 
accompanied them part way down the slope, and halting for a 
moment in a hollow, addressed them in his fiery, impetuous man- 
ner. He told them the battle rested with them. " Vive VEm.' 
pereur^^ answered him with a shout that was heard all over the 
field of battle. Ney then placed himself at their head, and began 
to move down the slope and over the field. No drum or trumpet 
or martial strain cheered them on. They needed nothing to fire 
their steady courage. The eyes of the world were on them, and 



LAST CHARGE C F THE OLD GUARD. 135 

the fate of Europe in their hands. The muffled tread of that 
magnificent legion alone was heard. For a moment the firing 
ceased along the British lines. The terror of Europe was on the 
march, and the last awful charge of the Imperial Guard, which had 
never yet failed, was about to be made. The crisis had come, 
the hour of destiny arrived, and Napoleon saw, with anxious eye, 
his Empire carried by that awful column as it disappeared in the 
smoke of battle. The firing ceased only for an instant ; the next 
moment the artillery opened, and that dense array was rent as if 
a hurricane had passed through it. Ney's horse sunk under 
him, and he mounted another and cheered on his men. Without 
wavering or halting that band of heroes closed up their shattered 
ranks, and moved on in the face of the most wasting fire that ever 
swept a field of battle. Again and again did Ney's horse sink 
under him, till five Ifdd fallen; and then on foot, with his drawn 
sabre in his hand, he marched at the head of his column. On, 
on, like the inrolling tide of the sea, that dauntless Guard pressed 
up to the very mouth of the cannon, and taking their fiery load 
full in their bosoms — walked over artillery, cannoniers and all, 
and pushed on through the British lines till they came within a 
few feet of where Wellington stood. The day seemed lost to the 
allies, when a rank of men, who had lain flat on their faces behind 
a low ridge of earth, and hitherto unseen by the French, heard 
the order of Wellington, " up and at 'em !" and springing to their 
feet, poured an unexpected volley into the very faces of that 
advancing Guard. Taken by surprise, and smitten back by the 
sudden shock, they had not time to rally before another and an- 
other volley completed the disorder, and that hitherto unconquer- 
able Guard was hurrying in wild confusion over the field. " The 
Guard recoils !" " the Guard recoils !" rung in despairing shrieks 
over the army, and all was over. Blucher effected his junction, 
and Wellington ordered a simultaneous advance along the whole 
line. The Old Guard, disdaining to fly, formed into two immense 
squares, and attempted to stay the reversed tide of battle. They 
stood and let the artillery plough through them in vain. The 
day was lost. Bonaparte's stvir had set forever, and his empire 
crumbled beneath him. 

Wellington met Hlucher at La Belle Alliance, the head-quar* 



i36 NIGHT AFTER THE BATTLE. 

tersof Napoleon, The former returned back over the field, wliile 
the lattei jsontinued the pursuit all night long, strewing the road 
for thirty miles with mangled corpses. 

And I was standing on this awful field, waving with grain just 
as it did on that mild morning. As my eye rested on this and 
that spot, where deeds of valour were done, and saw in imagina- 
tion those magnificent armies struggling for a continent, and heard 
the roar of cannon, the shocks of cavalry and the rolling fire of 
infantry, and saw the waving of plumes and torn banners amid 
the smoke of battle that curtained them in • what wonder is it that 
for the moment I forgot the carnage and the awful waste of hu- 
man life in the excitement and grandeur of the scene ? But let 
him who is in love with glory go over the bloody field after the 
thunder of battle is hushed, and the excitement of the strife is over. 
The rain is past, the heavy clouds have melted away, and behold 
the bright and tranquil moon is sailing through the starry heavens 
and looking serenely down on the bloody field. Under its re- 
proving light you see flashing swords, and glittering uniforms, 
and torn plumes, and heaps of mangled men. More than 50,000 
cumber the field, while thousands of wounded horses, still alive, 
rend the air with their shrill cries ; and at intervals break in the 
mingled curse and groan and prayer of the tens of thousands that 
are writhing amid the slaughtered heaps in mortal agony. Dis- 
membered limbs are scattered round like broken branches after a 
hurricane, while disembowelled corpses lie like autumn leaves on 
every side. Ghastly wounds greet the eye at every turn, while 
ever and anon comes the thunder of distant cannon on the night 
air, telling where Blucher still continues the work of destruction. 

And the bright round moon is shining down on all this, and the 
sweet air of June is breathing over it. Oh ! what a scene for 
God and angels to look upon ! What a blot on Nature's pure 
bosom ! Even Wellington, as he slowly rode over the field by 
moonlight, wept. The heart trained in the camp and schooled in 
the brutal life of the soldier could not endure the sight. But this 
is not all. Mournful as is the spectacle, and terrific as is the 
ghastly sight of that dead and dying army, and heartrending as 
are the shrieks and groans and blasphemies that make night hor- 
rible; the field is alive with moving forms, stooping over the pros- 



MONUMENTS OF THE DEAD. 137 

trate dead. Are they ministers of mercy come hither to bind up 
the wounded and assuage their sufferings, or are they beasts of 
prey stooping over the carcasses still warm with human blood ? 
Neither. They are men roaming the field for plunder. The 
dead and the wounded are alike ruthlessly trampled upon, as 
their bloody garments are rifled of their treasures. And this is 
glorious war, where heroes are made and deified ! As my im- 
agination rested on this picture, I no longer felt sympathy for Na- 
poleon, as he fled a fugitWe through the long night,, while the roar 
of cannon behind him t:..d where his empire lay trampled to the 
earth. 

But the suffering did not end here. To measure the amount 
of woe this one battle produced, go to the villages and cottages 
of France and England and Prussia. Count all the broken 
hearts it made — trace out the secret and open suffering that ends 
not with the day that saw its birth — and, last of all, go on to the 
judgment and imagine the souls that went from Waterloo and its 
fierce conflict to the rewards of Eternity ; and then measure, if 
you can, the length and breadth and depth and height of that 
cursed ambition which made Napoleon a minister of death to his 
race. His wild heart sleeps at last, and Nature smiles again 
around Waterloo, and the rich grain waves as carelessly as if 
nothing had happened. That Providence which never sleeps fix- 
ed the limits of that proud man, and finally left the " desolator 
desolate" to eat out his own heart on the rock of Helena. 

The field is covered with monuments to the dead, and a huge 
pyramid, surmoun-ted by a lion, rises from the centre of the plain. 
One monument tells where the Scotch Greys stood and were cut 
down, almost to a man — another points to the grave of Shaw, who 
killed nine Frenchmen before he fell. The little church in the 
village of Waterloo is filled with tablets commemorating the dead. 
One struck me forcibly. On it was recorded the death of a man 
oelonging to Wellington's suite. He was only eighteen years of 
age, and this was his twentieth battle. I never was more im- 
pressed with the brutality of the soldier than when my guide 
told me that he himself went over the field in search of plunder, 
the morning after the battle, and all he could find among the thou. 
Bands of corpses was one old silver watch. 



138 MARQUIS OF ANGLESEA'S LEG. 

My companion the English captain would go ana see the grave 
of the Marquis of Anglesea's leg, which has a separate monument 
erected to it. The Marquis visited th*? field of battle a short 
time since, and had the pleasure of reading the epitaph of his own 
leg. Taking no particular interest in the Marquis's lower ex- 
tremities, whether off or on, I did not see this monument.* 

* It is perhaps unne(X,ssary to state that I should nov) charge the crime and 
suffering of Waterloo^ on European despots rather than to Bonaparte. 



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